Positive Psychology in Education

---

Happy children do better in school – they are more productive, creative and successful. The world of education is beginning to recognise these benefits of positive psychology in increasing well-being amongst students and staff and the advantages of enabling people to work to and develop their strengths. Positive psychology programmes have also demonstrated that learning optimism prevents depression and anxiety in children, roughly halving their incidence over the following two years.

There are positive psychology initiatives in both the state and private sectors in the UK:

• In Newham, East London a well-being curriculum is being established
• Wellington College in Berkshire has a well-being programme
• Rookesbury Park School in Hampshire is developing into a ‘school of strengths’
• The Penn Resilience Programme is a well-being programme for children, which was created at the University of Pennsylvania. This programme is now being piloted in Hertfordshire, South Tyneside & Manchester.

Positive Psychology Training and its associates are involved in many of these initiatives. Our speciality is in positive youth development, in particular positive psychology for disaffected young people. Miriam ran a groundbreaking study in 2008-9 applying positive psychology to alcohol-misusing adolescents. The pilot was a great success with binge-drinking down significantly and an equally significant increase in well-being. The vast majority of the disaffected young people in the pilot re-engaged with education. You can read more on this page and download a summary of the research, which is being published in The Journal of Group Work in 2010.

We created an 8-week well-being programme of ‘Happiness Zones’ for vulnerable young people. Positive Psychology Training develops tailored programmes of positive psychology for the education and health sectors. If you’re interested in something similar please get in touch to discuss the possibilities.

We work with In-Volve, which runs alcohol, drug and diversionary services for young people and is pioneering the application of positive psychology with vulnerable adolescents. Miriam is also consulting on a well-being programme for Kids' Company in London.