Percy L Julian

Higher Ground partners with schools to support students and families, while centering the school as a foundation of the community. The schools that we support face high poverty rates, generational trauma, and historical discrimination. These challenging factors cause opportunity gaps in areas such as educational opportunities, healthcare, and enrichment time. Added up, these opportunity gaps have serious outcomes on an individual’s life and the overall community.

People cannot thrive while in survival mode. Each Restart SMART team has a trained Site Director, Student Support Specialist, and Family Support Specialist. Our teams first triage on an individual basis, using our Data-Powered Life Coaching Technology. After our teams have more insight into immediate needs, they begin to stabilize, provide support, and help build skills. Change does not happen overnight, and it cannot happen until people have their basic needs met.

Our Data-Powered Life Coaching Technology helps our team recognize existing or potential stress factors, traumatic experiences, service gaps, risks, and current supports/resources for each student. During these one-on-one meeting times, the Support Specialist takes notes and continually adds to a student’s progress. These notes are essential so that we can provide the appropriate services based on the youth’s needs and then follow up on evolving needs. The Support Specialist and the student can also track growth and real-time changes. Our Data-Powered Life Coaching Technology enables us to strategically navigate life with the youth and their families while helping them build skills and access any necessary opportunities to help with their goals.

The Restart SMART Strategy helps us provide a continuum of responsive, well-rounded care to youth and their families. We facilitate deep, local relationships as we work alongside youth, parents, schools, community health agencies, and others to address needs and help guide individuals on a path toward success and self-improvement.

Each partnered school is supported by a dedicated Restart SMART team comprising a Student Support Specialist, Family Support Specialist, and Site Director. These specialists undergo extensive training to ensure research-backed and best-practice methods when working with youth, families, schools, and community partners. In addition, the Restart SMART Strategy prioritizes the intentional selection of staff to match the unique needs of each school community, recognizing and addressing the long-lasting impacts of trauma and systemic inequities.

Day-to-day, Student Support Specialists support the school’s overall social and behavioral environments while helping students build long-term skills and executive functions. They meet individually with youth, employing a Strategic Life-Coaching Technology that documents their strengths, triggers, goals, and struggles. Family Support Specialists meet with families to help identify needs, potential service coordination, and mentoring based on need. At the same time, Site Directors partner with school administrators and community members to coordinate on-site services. Through these one-on-one meetings, the team helps identify gaps, needs, and potential local resources. After the team assesses foundational needs, they collaborate with local organizations to address the diverse wellness dimensions of students, families, and school professionals.

Their collaboration catalyzes significant individual and community change by helping individuals understand obstacles, access community resources, and achieve self-driven goals. The team will eventually transition to a locally-led steering committee.

Student Support Specialist:

• One-on-one Coach-Mentoring with Students

•Facilitates Group Social & Behavioral Skill Community Builders

•Supports FSS & SD in Partnership Development

•Supports FSS & SD with Service Coordination for Student Needs

Family Support:

•Engages Parents in Services & Identifying Family Needs

•Supports SSS with Group Social & Behavioral Skills Integration

•Supports SD in Partnership Development

•Supports SD with Service Coordination for Family Needs

•Provides Coach-Mentoring with Parents based on Need

Site Director:

•Leads Service Integration & Partner Engagement

•Develops & Facilitates the Steering Committee

•Fosters Partnership with School Personnel

•Leads & Supervises SMART Team Members

•Responsible for Overall On-Site Service Coordination

Restart SMART addresses the non-academic needs of youth and families, allowing the principal and the teachers to focus on high-quality education, curriculum, and other academic needs of their school. Instead of focusing on food, housing, clothing, or hygiene, students can focus on learning, building skills, and achieving other goals. When students and families have their basic needs met, the school begins to thrive.

Restart SMART sites make measurable strides in school improvement because of individual needs assessments, root-cause analysis, and strong networks. The Site Directors focus on building community partnerships and overall outreach to support the school’s most pressing needs. The Support Specialists serve as support systems for students and families while helping them build life skills that impact long-term success. When students, families, and community partnerships have a bit of extra attention, school professionals can focus on academics knowing that there is extra support.

In short, Restart SMART empowers communities to improve conditions for youth, families, and schools based on individual needs and goals. Trained community-based organizations that want to empower locally-led, sustainable change can replicate this work.

Restart SMART, powered by Higher Ground, is a locally driven initiative and adaptation of the Community School Model. Community Schools have existed in the United States for decades. They correlate with a strong trend of community empowerment, lower chronic and situational poverty, lower dropout rates, higher attendance, higher student attainment rates, and healthier community economic metrics. We know that if we focus on developing our youth’s executive functions, then their academic performance will improve; if we improve the wellness of the families, then we improve the wellness of the children; and if we improve the living conditions of the community, then the schools in that community will improve their outcomes.

Because each person is unique, the approach is deeply individual. Many of the students on our caseloads come from different backgrounds, cultures, and some have different behavioral health diagnoses. Each of these youth will require different supports and skills, depending on their specific lived experiences. Our Data-Powered Life Coaching method allows us to look at root causes of behaviors and triggers such as traumas, major life changes, and/or other key factors.

Through intentional one-on-one conversations, Restart SMART teams better understand each youth. A better understanding helps us address their individual needs according to the Eight Dimensions of Wellness (emotional, physical, occupational, social, spiritual, intellectual, environmental, and financial.) We also gain insight into their strengths, helpful habits, and resources.

An empowering environment is more healing than one that focuses solely on the challenges. We are works in progress, not problems to fix. Our communities are not bad places to live, where the ultimate goal is to escape. Our communities are rich in diversity, wisdom, skills, and dreams. Restart SMART reaches people where they are, helps people build the skills necessary to transform their lives, and supports them as they elevate their community through their achievements.

Yes, a lot! Community schools operate in almost 40 states and have a long-standing history of success. We encourage you to visit the Coalition for Community School’s website: https://www.communityschools.org