ISBE School Wellness Conference

While compliance with ISBE safety regulations—including crisis response, emergency planning, RTO, and mandated reporting—is essential, compliance alone does not create a safe school. This session reframes school safety as a holistic ecosystem rooted in strong relationships, trauma-responsive practices, restorative approaches, and consistent adult behavior. Participants will explore how emotional safety drives physical safety and how equity, predictability, and belonging reduce crisis behaviors.


The session draws on lived examples from therapeutic day schools that have eliminated RTO, increased attendance, improved student engagement, strengthened family partnerships, and created safer environments for staff and students. Participants will receive practical frameworks, tools, and ready-to-implement strategies to build a safer school culture without relying on punitive systems.

Today's students are navigating unprecedented levels of anxiety, disconnection, and dependence. Yet, they are also creative, compassionate, and full of potential. Drawing on key ideas from The Anxious Generation, The Amazing Generation, and Let Grow, this session explores how schools can intentionally balance connection, independence, and belonging to better support student well-being and growth. 


Participants will examine how overprotection, reduced autonomy, and limited opportunities for meaningful responsibility impact student resilience and how relationship-centered, SEL practices can reverse these trends. Through reflection, discussion, and practical examples, educators will learn how to create environments that empower students take healthy risks, build confidence, and develop essential life skills, while maintaining strong, supportive relationships. 


Participants will leave with an understanding of how current social, emotional, and environmental factors contribute to mental health disorders, strategies for fostering independence, resilience, and confidence through connection, and practical ways to elevate students' capacity to grow in academic AND essential life skills.

Teachers and school social workers are expected to provide emotional support to students while navigating complex demands and limited time. Over time, this emotional labor can lead to fatigue, blurred boundaries, and emotional overload. This session explores how school-based professionals can hold space for students with empathy and professionalism—without absorbing emotional weight that impacts their well-being or effectiveness. Participants will gain practical strategies to recognize emotional overload, maintain healthy boundaries, and release emotional residue throughout the school day.

Students across Illinois are experiencing unprecedented levels of stress, trauma, and emotional dysregulation, impacting learning, behavior, and school engagement. This interactive session equips educators, clinicians, and school leaders with practical trauma-informed strategies that strengthen student relationships, emotional regulation, and resiliency. Participants will explore how trauma affects the brain and learning while gaining concrete tools to help students identify triggers, regulate emotions, and transfer coping skills from counseling and support sessions into daily classroom life. This session supports districts in building trauma-responsive systems aligned to MTSS, SEL, and school climate initiatives that improve outcomes for both students and staff.