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Chapter 4 53 Positive Education 52 Chapter 4 53 Positive Education Martin Seligman Education Chair Zellerbach Family Professor of Psychology and Director of the Positive Psychology Center at the University of Pennsylvania Alejandro Adler Deputy Director of the Global Council for Happiness and Wellbeing, Center for Sustainable Development, Colum- bia University, and Director, Well-being Science and Policy, SDSN Education Committee Dr. Abdulla Al Karam Knowledge and Human Development Authority of Dubai Kai Ping Peng Tsinghua University Sir Anthony Seldon University of Buckingham Lea Waters The University of Melbourne The members wrote drafts about PosEd in their regions of the world but were not responsible for the report as a whole. We are grateful to all of the following people who provided updates about their projects: Hector Escamilla, Chris Stawski, Angela Duckworth, Justin Robinson, Mathew White, Yukun Zhao, Jo Maher, Kerry Sanderson, Alan Martin, Guang Zeng; Ye Hong, David Cooperrider, Steve Leventhal, Sharron Russell, and Tal Ben-Shahar. Since this Chapter is aimed at education policy and decision makers at all levels, we begin with a “How To” Checklist that summarizes ideal steps to a sustained systemic shift towards Positive Education. In the rest of this chapter, we expand on each of these twelve chronological steps of Positive Education. Positive Education “How To” Checklist 54 55 1. Contextual and cultural immersion and understanding 2. Multi-stakeholder engagement 3. Needs and goals assessment 4. Quantitative baseline measurement 5. Curricular development and adaptation 6. Training of educators 7. Curriculum implementation 8. Ongoing training and embedding 9. Post-intervention measurement and ongoing impact evaluation 10. Evidence-based policy design and legal institutional embeddedness 11. Large-scale policy implementation 12. Ongoing evidence-based evaluation, adaptation, and evolution Global Happiness and Wellbeing Policy Report 2019 Last year we reported on the state of Positive Our first case study comes from Geelong Grammar Education (PosEd) around the world. There has School, where Positive Education began in 2008. indeed been progress in the last twelve months on several fronts and in several nations and we will update the progress. But this chapter will “How to” implement Positive mostly be a “how to” guide. Positive Education Education: Whole School Approach is spreading and it seems to be a bottom-up Over the past ten years GGS has committed both movement. Students, teachers, and parents learn human and financial resources to its whole- about it, believe in it, and then advocate for it. school approach of nurturing both a love of But this requires convincing the people who learning and a love of life. While exciting actually run schools and universities to adopt it. progress and growth have been seen over the These executives have small budgets and many past decade, the school recognizes that Positive competing factions demanding their piece of the Education is an ongoing journey. Through budget. PosEd is not inexpensive and PosEd harnessing the heart, hands, and minds of requires training of teachers and re-tooling of the school community, the school has been curricula. Therefore, it is no simple matter to energized by the many specific activities, lessons convince education decision-makers to adopt it. and interventions that naturally ebb and flow. So, we start with four “how-to” case histories. What remains strong and bold, however, is a The first comes from Geelong Grammar School’s continual commitment to placing well-being at endeavors to build whole school Positive the heart of education (Norrish, 2015). Education. The second comes from Adelaide, Australia and shows how The University of How did Geelong Grammar School do it? Adelaide imbedded Positive Education into teacher training on a state-wide basis. The third Step 1: Carry out extensive research and due comes from Monterrey, Mexico and tells the story diligence of the first entire Positive Education University. The For GGS, it didn’t start in 2008 when Professor fourth comes the wide experience of Alejandro Martin Seligman and a team of colleagues from Adler in convincing ministers of education of the University of Pennsylvania trained 100 of our entire nations to adopt Positive Education. staff on a nine-day Positive Psychology course. It started more than two years earlier as the School We begin with our definition of our subject investigated ways to proactively nurture student matter. Positive Education has three aspects: well-being. What began as an initiative to build 1) The goal of PosEd is to produce both well- an integrated Wellbeing Centre Building, evolved being as well as to forward the traditional into complementing this iconic building with a outcomes of schooling. deep underlying philosophy and framework for 2) PosEd measures the well-being outcomes nurturing staff and student well-being. This before and after: measures of “happiness,” which philosophy was coined as ‘Positive Education’. are decomposed into elements less vague than Step 2: Engage with experts in the field the highly ambiguous term, “happiness.” In The empirical evidence and rigor that comes addition, PosEd measures the relief of ill-being with Positive Education is an important hook for or unhappiness, typically depression and anxiety. many staff and parents within a school community. Third, PosEd measures academic success. The To leverage this science, GGS was able to engage specific measures are detailed in our 2018 report. with a large number of national and international 3) PosEd uses reasonably well-validated interven- experts in the fields of positive psychology, resil- tions that increase well-being and decrease ill-being ience, educational and developmental psychology (for meta-analyses of positive interventions and their and more. Each visitor’s expertise added insights validation, see Sin & Lyubomirsky, 2009 and Boller, to our ever-evolving program and philosophy and Haverman, Westerhof et al, 2013). The specific contributed to the validation of this new field. interventions are detailed in our 2018 report. Step 3: Bring the community along on the Given this definition we now turn to four case journey histories, four lessons in how to spread PosEd Providing clear and consistent messaging as to at scale. the aims and hopes of Positive Education is essential. Articles in school publications, public The second case study is how to radically change addresses, opportunities for parents to ask teacher education. questions and seek clarification were all part of the implementation plan. All stakeholders were kept regularly informed, using jargon-free The Wellbeing Framework for Initial language and were invited to ask any questions Teacher Education at the University and raise any concerns. The key personnel of Adelaide leading the change welcomed questions and contributions from colleagues, understood and Teaching is a highly complex profession. Aspiring embraced skepticism but urged staff not to take teachers start wanting to contribute positively to a cynical, closed-minded approach to Positive learning and engagement with school students, Education. The hope was to both kindle curiosity but are often overwhelmed with the complexity 56 and develop a sense of shared ownership for our of their roles. They grapple with professional 57 staff, parents and students. identity while confronted by poor school literacy and numeracy, and this results in widespread Step 4: Combine the decision-making authority declines in student engagement in schools. of the School leaders with the knowledge and Teachers’ well-being itself has a significant role enthusiasm of the teachers who have daily to play in the attraction, retention and sustain- contact with the students ability of teachers for the profession. To consider With School leadership on board and fully the teachers’ well-being is new across the world committed to the implementation of Positive as most research to date has focused on the Education, it was then vital to empower teachers deficit model that contributes to an unwell in the classroom, and non-teaching colleagues in teacher. Very little research identifies how to their offices to trial, adapt, design and pilot ideas develop well teachers and sustain their health and activities to nurture well-being in their and well-being. We argue for an equitable and environments and circles of influence. sustainable approach, one that integrates Step 5: Ensure sustainability through establishing well-being as a part of pre-service teacher an in-house training team education from the very outset. We claim this To ensure the long-term viability of Positive will better prepare pre-service teachers for Education it became evident that the School the complexities of the profession. It also is a needed to invest in building the capacity of a pathway to show pre-service teachers how to small number of colleagues to lead and drive the teach well-being to their future students. ongoing delivery of Positive Education training to new staff members, new parents and new The University of Adelaide students. This led to full-time Positive Education The University of Adelaide’s School of Education faculty. Of course, beyond the initial training is one of the oldest, yet most innovative and course, ongoing professional learning sessions influential, educational research-intensive schools are vital to keep the concepts fresh and to in Australia. Over the past 18 months, the School ensure the community
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