"Living and Learning Together: Raising Awareness, Preventing Mental Disorders, and Strengthening Mental Resilience in School Communities" is a modular, multi-faceted program implemented within the school community, focusing on:
- Raising awareness of mental health issues, available services, and networks
- Destigmatizing mental illness
- Primary prevention
- Promoting rights with an emphasis on inclusion
- Intervening in in-school crises and external crises affecting the school community
- Supporting general and special education issues
- Providing experiential education and psychoeducation for students, parents, and teachers
- Promoting mental resilience in school communities, enriching their mental lives, and improving their overall mental well-being and quality of life
The program involves holistic, universal, and interdisciplinary mental health interventions that promote well-being and mental health by enhansing mental resilience and enriching the mental lives of participating students, teachers, and parents.
It systematically fosters a non-directive atmosphere, creating an unprecedented, creative, and emotionally safe environment, introducing new knowledge and processes into school life, and aiming to develop communication skills, facilitate expression, and acquire new knowledge to solve problems or crises challenging the school community in Greece.
The program is designed to embrace, include, and connect the school community's triad of "parents, teachers, and students" with mental health specialists and the available forces of the broader community in a reverse dynamic chain, in an unbreakable unity of strengthening mental health and resilience. The experiential interventions are designed, implemented, and evaluated with the active participation of the interested parties at all stages (co-production) and according to the expressed needs of the school units (tailor-made).
Vision and Philosophy:
The vision and philosophy of the program are encapsulated in the tripartite message:
- Together, better!... easier!... and happier!
- Together! We change ourselves, change our team, and promote our well-being!
- Together! For mental resilience, creativity, and skill development
Methodology - Innovation:
The experiential interventions are designed, implemented, and evaluated with active participation from all interested parties at all stages (co-production) and according to the expressed needs of school units (tailor-made).
Systematic use of innovative techniques and methodologies, such as:
- Co-production and co-creation
- Active listening
- An attitude of positivity, complete and unconditional acceptance, love, respect, and trust towards the evolving individual
- Methodically building an emotional relationship of equality, cooperation, and alliance with all participants, promoting social-group values such as collectivity, solidarity, and equality
Key Features:
- Tailor-made intervention design for students, parents, and educational staff according to the expressed needs of school communities, students, and parents
- Holistic, universal, and interdisciplinary experiential interventions designed, implemented, and evaluated with the collaboration and active participation of all stakeholders in all phases of the program
- Our co-creation approach links mental health with human rights and the psychosocial model of social/community psychiatry
- Our co-production approach ensures the representation of all stakeholders and the inclusion of diversity without exclusions
- Evidence-based approach: Use of a combined model and techniques from cutting-edge therapeutic approaches such as psychoanalytic prism, action research, non-directive intervention (NDI), art therapy, theater and art therapies, systemic therapy, trauma-focused cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT - TF), drama/dance/music therapy, and psychoeducation
- Capitalizing on deliverable tools from European Erasmus+ programs
- Education, psychoeducation, and experiential workshops
- Networking the school community with mental health professionals and the broader community forces
- Support for creating bonds between the school and the broader social environment (local mental health services and professionals, civil society organizations, and other stakeholders)
Priority is given to school units facing internal or external crises due to natural disasters or reporting problems with diversity integration (refugees, immigrants, vulnerable groups), violence, delinquency, bullying incidents, anxiety and stress-related behaviors, self-harm incidents, trauma, loss, and grief
Innovative Characteristics for Greek Schools:
The program systematically fosters a non-directive, person-centered climate, creating an unprecedented, creative, and emotionally safe environment for Greek schools, introducing new knowledge and processes into school life. It aims to develop communication skills, facilitate expression, and achieve democratic citizenship through experiential learning to solve problems or crises challenging the school community.
Utilizing the best practices of the program in school life
- Integrating innovative material into existing school programs (flexible zone, skill workshops, etc.)
- Creating a climate of "ownership"
- Utilizing a flexible educational modular program
- Training teachers in the innovative learning model and psychoeducation to comfortably fulfill their psycho-pedagogical role
- Enhancing the mental resilience of teachers and parents (experiential seminars, workshops, parent schools, etc.)
- Offering experiential education and learning: Employing a variety of projection, bodily, and other expressive techniques utilizing artistic, creative, and theatrical expression from various schools, cultures, and traditions.
