Assistant Head for Student Life Barrett Jamison chats with School Counselor Kiara Best in the new Center for Student Life Space, while Learning Specialist Ann Vradenburg checks in with students.
By Camila Ryder
If you were to follow our students around for a day, you’d soon realize how much they’re managing. They juggle academics, sports, performing arts, clubs, and their social lives. They’re simultaneously going through immense personal growth, developing their identities, exploring their autonomy and agency, building relationships, and understanding who they are in the world.
That can be a lot to take on, for anyone of any age, and students undergo many changes as they move from middle school to 9th grade to senior year.
Prep seeks to create a community that our students can feel rooted in and supported throughout every step of their time here, starting with the social-emotional learning (SEL) that is central to Prep’s mission of nurturing a learning environment that is trusting, collaborative, evolving, and equitable. It’s a partnership between teachers, students, staff, administrators, and parents to ensure our students have the best possible Prep experience.
“We want every student to have a meaningful, rich, and engaging middle school and high school experience at Prep, both inside and outside the classroom,” Assistant Head for Student Life Barrett Jamison says. “Part of the Prep culture is to encourage students to get involved at school, but that can be challenging when it comes to balance. Our students might ask, ‘How do I play on the soccer team, get my homework done, and still have time to see my friends on the weekend?’”
Prep’s Student Support Team is here to answer the call. This dynamic network is comprised of Jamison, Dean of Students Beth Pattinelli, newest team members School Counselor Kiara Best and Learning Specialist Ann Vradenburg, and six grade level deans, including this year’s deans Heba Allen (7th grade), Claire Kinder (8th grade), Abel Fuentes (9th grade), Megan Burton (10th grade), Katie Canton (11th grade), and Scott Myers (12th grade).
“We provide structural support to help students balance their schedules, time, and wellbeing so that they can participate in the life of the school,” Jamison says.
The overall goal for the Student Support Team is to help every Prep student thrive. As students form their identities and explore their passions, some students might need additional guidance in this process. The Student Support Team is right by their side.
Every other week, the newly formed Student Support Committee meets to check in with each other about what’s happening around campus and discuss what students or classes might need additional support. Comprised of Jamison, Best, Vradenburg, Pattinelli (who represents the deans), Director of College Counseling Brooke Yoshino, and Athletic Trainer Andres Alamillo, the Committee represents the many facets of a students’ physical, mental, intellectual, and emotional growth at Prep. In addition to those biweekly meetings, Pattinelli, Best, and Vradenburg meet every week.
“We’re able to see our students in a 360-degree view based on their academics, college counseling, athletics, extracurriculars, injuries, or illness. We don’t compartmentalize students by their mental health or academic needs—we come up with solutions for them as a whole person so that we all can then meet their needs as they walk into the door,” Vradenburg says.
“We’re all trying to work together to fit the students’ needs best and send them to the proper person to help them—there is always the right person, it’s just getting them there,” Best says.
It’s Okay to Ask for Help
Mental health and social-emotional wellbeing have become much more publicly acknowledged and discussed, especially at schools. Just as adults do, students find themselves dealing with stress, anxiety, external pressures, and personal conflicts, not to mention living through a pandemic.
“A lot of times, young adults feel like they’re the only one that has this experience or stress going on in their life, or they feel that they have no one to talk to because, ‘No one else understands, or no one else has been through that.’ But it’s not true,” Best says. “People are experiencing these issues all the time. Our work is to let them know: you are not alone.”
“Prep is a place where it’s okay to ask for help,” Jamison explains. “This is really part of the fabric of our school. We want students to be self-aware and to know when they’re struggling, and to feel comfortable and confident in going to someone and saying, ‘I need a little extra help here.’ Whatever or wherever here is, whether it’s socially, emotionally, or academically. The Student Support Team is essential in being here for our students.”
As school counselor, Best counsels students dealing with stress, anxiety, exploring autonomy and agency, and navigating the new world of the pandemic, including managing expectations.
“A lot of adolescents, prior to COVID, could do all these different things, but times are different now,” Best explains. “They still have the same expectations as to what they were doing prior, and when they don’t meet those expectations, then they’re really down on themselves and wondering why they can’t meet these expectations.”
Vradenburg works one-on-one with students, teachers, and deans to help them troubleshoot through academic subjects, learning differences, time management, and organization skills—areas she sees as essential to equity and inclusion.
“I want to be able to spread equity amongst all the students so that they get their needs met, uniquely,” Vradenburg says. “The one thing that struck me that is so amazing here that I know is not present on other high school or middle school campuses is the flexibility that our teachers give these students to be able to succeed on assessments for projects. Instead of teaching to the crowd, our faculty teach to the individuals.”
Building Relationships and Connections
When asked what was the most important work she has been doing this year, Pattinelli had one word: connections. “Providing the opportunities and spaces for students to connect with each other and their teachers and coaches has been our top priority,” Pattinelli says. “Just engaging them in all that the Prep community has to offer, like club life, athletics, performing arts, and visual arts shows...and doing all of that in community with each other.”
On top of every student’s personal identity, each grade has its own unique identity that requires the expertise of the grade level dean. “Each grade level is at different stages developmentally, so they experience life, both at school and outside, very differently,” Pattinelli says. “Deans are helping our students not only navigate the developmental stage of their grade, but they’re also finding ways to help them bond as a class.”
As both a teacher and 7th grade dean Heba Allen knows how important her role is in helping 7th graders and their parents as they start at an entirely new school environment.
“Since 7th graders are all new to Prep, the biggest thing we emphasize is integrating them into the Prep community right away and we do that in a lot of different ways,” Allen says, including their class trip, advisory groups, peer counseling groups, and the 8th grade buddy program. “We try to mix it up for them right off the bat to help them get to know each other and help them make friends, get to know upperclassmen and faculty members, so that pretty early on, they feel well integrated into the community.”
As students move from middle school through high school, grade level deans are there for them every step of the way. Once they reach senior year, they’ve developed into the leaders of the school.
Independence and leadership are two central themes that 12th grade dean Scott Myers has found define senior year. “The school, the families, and the students themselves accept the vital importance of developing confidence and clarity in personally resolving challenges in their academic and social lives,” Myers explains. “In my first step as dean at the Class of 2022’s junior retreat, I invited them to envision a senior year framed around their roles as campus leaders. They remember the admiration they held for seniors when they were new to Prep, and they relish the joy and responsibility of leadership.”
What’s Ahead
Over the next year, Prep is expanding its advisory program to all grade levels. Currently the program serves 7th, 8th, and 9th graders through weekly advising sessions, where they meet in small groups led by an advisor, chat about what’s happening in their lives, and bond with their classmates. The program is designed in partnership with the Institute for Social and Emotional Learning (IFSEL) and based on needs that have been identified by grade level deans.
This is one of the most robust changes to Prep’s student support services in the past few years, and it will dovetail with Prep’s other long-standing support services, including academic advising at each grade level, grade-level class meetings for faculty and students, and student-led programs like Peer Counseling, 8th grade buddies (in which seniors work with 8th graders), and Senior Leaders, a network of seniors providing academic support in all subject areas.
Best is developing the curriculum for the expanded advisory program. “Right now, we’re devising a plan with different topics for advisory groups to discuss. It’s meant to help guide students in small group settings where they can talk comfortably and openly with the same group of people for the entire year,” she says. “It helps to really build that connection and understanding between the students, faculty, and staff.”
“We are all trying to build positive relationships, between the students and between the students and adults, so that our students themselves can feel confident that they will be successful here at Prep,” Jamison says. “We want to strengthen our students to help them reach their potential and we’re doing that in a very individual way, person by person, student by student. Our students are not just names on a list or names in a meeting. We are each working closely and individually with all our students to help them find their space at Prep.”