Enhancing School Climate: Fostering Success with a Balanced Discipline Approach

Format

Individual Presentation

First Presenter's Institution

Stephen F. Austin State University

First Presenter’s Email Address

summerpannell@gmail.com

First Presenter's Brief Biography

Dr. Summer Pannell currently serves as Associate Professor of Educational Leadership at Stephen F. Austin State University and as Director of the National Institute for Restorative Discipline. She has over two decades of experience as an educational leadership faculty member and P-12 administrator and teacher. During her tenure as principal, she received a Champion of Change Award for her school closing achievement gaps and served on collaborative committees to develop statewide principal and teacher evaluation systems. Dr. Pannell holds superintendent, principal, and teacher certification in multiple states and is a certified trainer in Restorative Discipline Practices, Neuro-Linguistic Practitioner (NLP), and Behavior Threat Assessment.

Second Presenter's Institution

Georgia Southern University

Second Presenter’s Email Address

jmcbrayer@georgiasouthern.edu

Second Presenter's Brief Biography

Dr. Juliann Sergi McBrayer is an Associate Professor in Educational Leadership at Georgia Southern University and Co-Director of the National Youth Advocacy and Resilience Research Center centered around scholarly practitioners and interdisciplinary research via community partnerships. She holds a Doctorate and Educational Specialist from Georgia Southern University, a Master’s degree from Ohio University, and a Bachelor's degree from SUNY College at Buffalo. She has served over 20 years as an educational leadership associate and assistant professor, educational program coordinator, instructional school leader, professional development and federal programs coordinator, classroom teacher, and teacher leader. As a scholarly practitioner, her research interests include the development, implementation, and assessment of educational leadership and teacher preparation programs with a focus on purposeful, collaborative, and sustainable professional learning and programming to ensure effectiveness and accountability while emphasizing community partnerships.

Third Presenter's Institution

Stephen F. Austin State University

Third Presenter’s Email Address

uriegasb@sfasu.edu

Third Presenter's Brief Biography

Dr. Uriegas is an Associate Professor in the Department of Human Services and Educational Leadership at Stephen F. Austin State University where he teaches in their M.Ed. and Ed.D. programs. Prior to his arrival at SFA, Dr. Uriegas spent 17 years as a teacher, coach, and principal in Texas public schools. Dr. Uriegas holds a doctorate in Educational Leadership from Texas A&M University-Kingsville. Brian’s research interests are centered on rural education with foci on post-secondary readiness, students of poverty, career and technical education, diversity, equity, and inclusion, school leadership and advancement for Latinx students and faculty in higher education. Dr. Uriegas recently completed his term as Chair of the SFA Faculty Senate.

Location

Session Five

Strand #1

Heart: Social & Emotional Skills

Strand #2

Health: Mental & Physical Health

Relevance

This session will help school administrators and staff understand the power of the Negativity Effect and how to overcome it when building and sustaining a positive school culture. Participants will learn the power of negative and positive reinforcement and strategies to utilize both to foster accountability, build positive relationships, address harm and trauma, and improve the school climate. These strategies will assist those who work with youth in designing and implementing effective approaches to dealing with the challenges presented in their unique educational setting.

Brief Program Description

The educational world is full of buzzwords, keeping educators focused on the great initiative or program in hopes it will solve their problems. What educators need, though, is not the latest and greatest packaged program. Rather than a one-size-fits-all approach, they need a toolbox of strategies to assist them in dealing with the unique challenges presented in their educational setting. This session presents the tools for implementing a balanced approach to accountability to build healthy school communities, support students and teachers, and address discipline issues. Participants will learn the power of negative and positive reinforcement and research-based strategies to utilize both to foster accountability, build positive relationships, address harm and trauma, and improve the school climate.

Summary

This session will equip administrators and school staff with the knowledge and skills to build positive relationships and foster accountability and self-discipline within their school community. Through the exploration of effective strategies to address mindset change and implementing a schoolwide Balanced Discipline model, participants will learn how to implement strategies to foster positive relationships, address harm and trauma, and improve the school climate for all stakeholder groups.

This instructional and experiential workshop presents the tools for implementing a successful restorative discipline model that places the importance of relationships at the heart of the educational experience in order to build healthy school communities, support students and teachers, and address discipline issues. Participants will learn steps to assess the readiness of their schools for this approach and the action steps they can begin to take to convey and implement Restorative Discipline concepts in ways that ensure necessary buy-in from a variety of stakeholder groups.

Evidence

Tierney and Baumeister (2019) discussed how the Negativity Effect permeates everything we do. The impact of this theoretical underpinning is evident in our current school climate and culture. Student discipline issues are at an all-time high, and most educator preparation programs are not equipping teachers and leaders with the necessary skills to address the issues (Pannell et al., 2020). Further, the education world is full of one-size-fits-all programs promising to have the answers. In reality, they turn out to be another failed attempt at blanketing a problem to provide a solution. Schools face their own unique challenges; therefore, educators should not buy into a packaged program. Rather, they should be equipped with interdisciplinary knowledge and skills to understand the root causes of problems and effective measures to respond appropriately to those problems.

Balanced Discipline draws from research in psychology and education to help educators understand the implications of positive and negative reinforcement when dealing with student behavior. Further, it touts an approach that builds capacity within educators to develop and implement a balanced approach to building a healthy, sustainable school culture that supports student success. This approach has been linked to improvement in student behavior, reduction in discipline incidents, and improved overall school climate in many school districts since its implementation.

Learning Objective 1

Getting acquainted with the power of bad and the Negativity Effect

Learning Objective 2

Understanding how negative and positive reinforcement can be used to ensure student success

Learning Objective 3

Develop research-based strategies to develop and implement a balanced and sustainable approach to improving the school climate

Keyword Descriptors

discipline, balanced discipline, restorative discipline, neurolinguistic programming, behaviorism

Presentation Year

2024

Start Date

3-5-2024 10:15 AM

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Mar 5th, 10:15 AM

Enhancing School Climate: Fostering Success with a Balanced Discipline Approach

Session Five

The educational world is full of buzzwords, keeping educators focused on the great initiative or program in hopes it will solve their problems. What educators need, though, is not the latest and greatest packaged program. Rather than a one-size-fits-all approach, they need a toolbox of strategies to assist them in dealing with the unique challenges presented in their educational setting. This session presents the tools for implementing a balanced approach to accountability to build healthy school communities, support students and teachers, and address discipline issues. Participants will learn the power of negative and positive reinforcement and research-based strategies to utilize both to foster accountability, build positive relationships, address harm and trauma, and improve the school climate.