PMP485: Preventing Trauma Before it Happens with Dr. Jan Harrell

A Quick Note to Listeners:

Before this week’s interview, Will Parker and Jen Schwanke take some time to answer a listener question. 

—- The Question of the Week is supported by Summer Pops Math Workbooks.

Principals, when students practice math over the summer, math scores go up. What’s your summer math plan this year? A great way to start is by ordering FREE summer workbook samples at Summer Pops Workbooks.com. —-

This week’s question is: 

It’s very difficult to change one’s mind. When was the last time you were surprised to learn something new? How did this new learning make you feel? 

Listen in to hear their response!

Meet Jan Harrell: 

Dr. Jan Harrell is the creator of emotional education curricula now used in schools and prisons, with materials also accepted for use in both U.S. and Canadian federal prison systems—programs that help prevent bullying, build empathy, and transform communities. Her curricula bring students and inmates together by highlighting the shared human experience and transcending cultural, ethnic, and racial divides. Passionate about advancing human understanding, Dr. Harrell offers her programs to schools and juvenile justice/corrections at no cost, driven by a vision of preventing trauma before it happens and empowering young people with lifelong emotional wisdom.

Addressing Student Anxiety: 

Jan has a long history in clinical psychology, but she is on this week’s episode of Principal Matters Podcast because of her outreach to schools. When addressing how school leaders should think about addressing the painful anxiety of students in schools, Jan talks about how a revolution in education is missing. Throughout the history of education, schools have focused on teaching human survival, through teaching problem solving abilities and teaching students about physical well-being. According to Jan, what is missing is education on emotional well-being. We are taught how to take care of our body, but not how to take care of our emotional well-being. Jan gives the example of a fire alarm going off. If a fire alarm goes off, we immediately know what to do. If an emotional alarm goes off and we do not know what to do about it, we go into a reactive state. Students need to be given the opportunity to learn what to do when their emotional alarm goes off.  

Success of the Curriculum:

Jan shares that her curriculum originated because of a friend who was the Dean of Students at a local high school. This friend would often talk to her about how her students suffered from anxiety. This friend piloted Jan’s program in her high school, and through this experience Jan learned that the issues of being a human being transcended every difference between us. The students in her program were brought together into an intimate family-like situation in which they felt comfortable being vulnerable and sharing their trauma and anxiety with each other. This same framework has been utilized in prisons with both juveniles and adults, with the same results. Through teaching the concept of understanding the self and learning how to work through issues with other people, Jan’s curriculum allows people to free themselves from the cycle of being in an emotionally reactive state. 

Helping Students Avoid being Sabotaged by the Emotions:

Towards the end of the episode, Jan offers teachers and principals some strategies to help students avoid being sabotaged by their own emotions. She talks about how students often come to school feeling tortured and are filled with reactive emotions. Teachers and principals can try to suppress or judge their reaction, or they can view it as a gift that creates a teaching moment and helps students connect with their own wisdom. It is important to give students the rightness of their own feelings, not the wrongness. Equally important is teaching students that they can figure things out within themselves and between themselves. Helping students learn to guide the worst emotions the mind has to offer provides them with the tools to break out of an emotionally reactive state. 

Staying Connected:

If you are interested in learning more about Jan’s curriculum, she is currently offering it and her consultation for free. The only strings attached are that she wants to know that it’s being used and that it does not get fed into AI. You can reach out to her at janharrell.now@outlook.com or on Linkedin.

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