Disciplinary actions down by half at Carpinteria High School

Principal credits AHA! and other innovations

January 15, 2008

Carpinteria, Calif.
Carpinteria High School principal Gerardo Cornejo reports that student suspensions and other disciplinary actions at the school, specifically for defiance, fighting, and other aggressive behaviors, are down 52% this year over last. He credits an emotional intelligence and diversity appreciation curriculum delivered by the Academy of Healing Arts for Teens (AHA!) and other school-wide innovations for the improvement.

We’ve really worked to change the atmosphere on campus through a number of approaches, Cornejo explains.”For example, we assigned an older student mentor, whom we call a Link Leader, to each incoming freshman student. The day before school started this year, each freshman got a call from his or her Link Leader, reminding them to report to the gym at 8:00 the next morning.”

The freshman class arrived before the rest of the student body and gathered outside the gym. When we opened the doors, we welcomed them with music, balloons, and all the teachers and Link Leaders clapping. Then the Link Leaders gave the freshmen their name tags and class schedules, accompanied them to their classes and introduced them to their teachers.

At 10:00 the rest of the student body reported and we had a campus-wide barbecue. I put on a sumo suit and kids wrestled with me. We made the first day of school as fun and welcoming as possible, to reduce tensions and make students feel that we’re all on the same side.

Cornejo has employed other innovations, as well. One of the most substantive has been the decision to offer AHA!’s character-building/emotional intelligence (EQ) and diversity appreciation (prejudice reduction) curriculum to every sophomore student twice a month during English period.

Cornejo first invited AHA! on campus last spring, when tensions between rival groups were escalating. AHA! met monthly with the then-freshman class. As a result, disciplinary actions among this year’s sophomore class (which is continuing to benefit from the AHA! curriculum) are down 58%, compared to the campus-wide drop of 52%.

The classroom sessions are based on workbooks from the Become Your Best Self series written by Dr. Jennifer Freed, the co-founder/co-director of AHA! One workbook addresses Character: Empowering Yourself with Emotional Intelligence and another Compassion: Diversity Appreciation and Prejudice Reduction. These are the topics Cornejo has asked AHA! to explore with the sophomore class.

The AHA! curriculum has taught kids that they have more in common with each other than they might think, despite their differences in appearance, Cornejo says.It’s a lot more difficult to be angry and confrontational with someone you know has the same problems that you do.