Dec 6, 2018, University Place, WA, Tacoma Weekly: Wilson High School introduces Edge Foundation coaching to help students with ADHD and adverse childhood experiences succeed https://tacomaweekly.com/news/wilson-high-school-introduces-edge-foundation-coaching-to-help-students-with-adhd-and-adverse-childhood-experiences-succeed/ Wilson High School for the first time is training staff to provide executive-style coaching to students with executive function challenges often experienced because of adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) or trauma, attention-deficit/ hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), and/or non-traditional learning styles. Wilson High School is the sixth school in the Tacoma School District to use a coaching program designed and administered by the non-profit Edge Foundation. Other Tacoma schools that are using Edge coaching include Jason Lee, Giaudrone, Mason and Truman middle schools and Oakland High School. Students in those schools have shown significant improvements since the coaching program was introduced in 2011. The Edge Foundation has proven that providing personalized coaching to at-risk students helps them succeed and meet their potential. The foundation was founded by Neil Peterson, who has led public transportation agencies in Seattle, Oakland and Los Angeles and was founding chief executive of Flexcar, now known as Zipcar. He started the foundation after seeing how executives benefit from coaching. The foundation was established to test whether providing specialized, one-on-one coaching could turn around students who are at risk of dropping out of school due to adverse childhood experiences and executive-function challenges (such as ADHD) that inhibit social and emotional learning. The foundation’s goal is to provide coaches to all 7- to 24-year-olds in the country. … Peterson said. “They have trouble making good decisions and lack the skills needed to succeed in school – the ability to plan, prioritize, initiate, stay on task, focus, follow up, and adjust to change.” In the school setting, these executive function challenges get in the way of student success. These students: • make bad decisions, • are bright, but underachieve, • work hard, but forget to turn in their homework, • try to fit in, but are impulsive and disruptive, • want to do their best, but don’t possess the right executive function tools, • are struggling at school, yet know that a diploma is critical to breaking the poverty cycle, and • are chronically absent or are at risk of dropping out of school and unlikely to go to college. Adverse childhood experiences (ACEs), which include abuse, neglect, and family/household challenges, are common with nearly two-thirds of participants in a landmark study by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and Kaiser Permanente. More than one in five in the study reported three or more ACEs. The CDC also estimates that 5.2 million children in the United States have formal diagnoses of ADHD, one of the best-known barriers to social and emotional Learning. The National Health Interview Survey estimates that nearly 10 percent of school-aged children have ADHD. These numbers do not include those who are undiagnosed. The Edge Foundation helps students succeed at school by training school personnel – teachers, para-professionals, security personnel, counselors and administrators – to provide one-on-one, weekly, 20- to 25-minute coaching to individual students. “Edge coaches help students develop the executive function skills that allow them to make good decisions in school and in life,” Peterson said. Edge Foundation coaches currently work in more than 30 schools in Washington state, California, New York, Washington, D.C., and North Carolina. Why has Wilson High School signed on with the Edge Foundation? Because Edge Foundation coaching works. …
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Childhood Lost
Children today are noticeably different from previous generations, and the proof is in the news coverage we see every day. This site shows you what’s happening in schools around the world. Children are increasingly disabled and chronically ill, and the education system has to accommodate them. Things we've long associated with autism, like sensory issues, repetitive behaviors, anxiety and lack of social skills, are now problems affecting mainstream students. Blame is predictably placed on bad parenting (otherwise known as trauma from home).
Addressing mental health needs is as important as academics for modern educators. This is an unrecognized disaster. The stories here are about children who can’t learn or behave like children have always been expected to. What childhood has become is a chilling portent for the future of mankind.
Anne Dachel, Media editor, Age of Autism
http://www.ageofautism.com/media/
(John Dachel, Tech. assist.)
What will happen in another 4 years? How can we go on like this? This is a national (and international) problem of monumental proportions. We have an entire new class of children who cannot be accommodated by the system: many are manifestly neurologically impaired. Meanwhile, the government and the medical profession sleep on regardless.
John Stone,
UK media editor, Age of Autism
The generation of American children born after 1990 are arguably the sickest generation in the history of our country.
Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.
It seemed to me that with rising autism prevalence, you’d also see rising autism costs to society, and it turns out, the costs are catastrophic.
They calculated that in 2015 autism cost the United States $268 billion and they projected that if autism continues at its current rate, we’re looking at one trillion dollars a year in autism costs by 2025, so within five years.
Toby Rogers, PhD, Political economist
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