Supporting Resilient, Healthy, and Balanced Students
The last two years have seen the formation of a strong partnership between administrative staff, Trustees, and parents to move our student wellness work forward.
One of our priorities under Experience: Ready Today, for Tomorrow is Supporting Resilient, Healthy, and Balanced Students. As our Strategic Plan states, “Our students’ ability to achieve academic success and manage life's inevitable challenges requires the ability to approach their future with confidence, resilience, and a set of tools that will help them achieve lifelong healthy habits.” Partnering with parents to serve this goal benefits our students and positions them well for their next steps beyond Burke’s.
The work began in the 2022-23 school year by asking how Burke’s defines wellness. This question guided the Center for Wellness Exploration Team, a group of parents, faculty, and staff who researched elements of wellness to create a definition for Burke’s:
Burke’s defines “wellness” as a holistic intentional practice that builds our capacity to navigate the ups and downs in life, fostering self-awareness and a shared culture of connectedness and belonging in order for all members of our community to thrive.
Wellness is multidimensional, integrating physical, emotional, social, environmental, intellectual, and civic elements.
The Team then used that definition to conduct community interviews, connecting with parents, students, faculty, and staff to gather information on areas of strength and growth for Burke’s in the area of wellness.
Supporting student wellness and resilience is a shared responsibility between home and school. A priority coming out of the committee work that first year was to bring parents along in this work through an Exploring Wellness Parent Committee spearheaded and led by Board member Star Moore in partnership with Associate Head of School Alice Moore. The Committee’s goals are to:
- Gather, curate, and disseminate educational resources related to dimensions of wellness for families and other members of Burke’s community.
- Plan and facilitate “Exploring Wellness” conversations for Burke’s parents and caregivers focused on specific wellness topics, allowing parents to share information, insights, aspirations, and challenges in a supportive environment.
During the 23-24 school year, the Exploring Wellness Parent Committee hosted two events, a book talk in the fall on the book Never Enough: When Achievement Culture Becomes Toxic—And What We Can Do About It facilitated by Crystal Land, a consultant from Leadership & Design; and a spring event that featured a panel of Burke’s parents in the mental health field who spoke about cultivating resilience in our children and how the ability to do this is connected to parent resilience.
The Exploring Wellness Parent Committee also published resources in Tuesday Notes about wellness topics throughout the school year. Podcasts, articles, and videos about topics like Environmental Wellness, Digital/Tech/Social Media, Civic Wellness, Creativity & Wellness, and Physical Wellness were shared. This year, the topics of sleep (published in the December 10 Tuesday Notes), Resilience & Thriving, Nutrition, and Digital Wellness will be shared. Any resources published in Tuesday Notes are housed in the Resources section of MyBurkes, under the “Wellness Resources” tile.
This year, the Committee hosted a fall book talk on the book The Anxious Generation; How the Great Rewiring of Childhood Is Causing an Epidemic of Mental Illness. An engaged group of parents came out on a stormy night, eager to connect and share ideas and support around technology and phone use with their children. The Committee is starting to plan a spring event, details of which will be shared in Tuesday Notes.
Burke's mission is to educate, encourage and empower girls. Our school combines academic excellence with an appreciation for childhood so that students thrive as learners, develop a strong sense of self, contribute to community, and fulfill their potential, now and throughout life.
Burke's admits students of any race, color, national and ethnic origin to all the rights, privileges, programs, and activities generally accorded or made available to students at the school. It does not discriminate on the basis of race, color, national and ethnic origin in administration of its educational policies, admissions policies, scholarship and loan programs, and athletic and other school-administered programs.