Emotional Wellbeing and Mental Health Advice and Support
Our staff are our greatest resource. We place a significant emphasis on staff wellbeing to ensure our staff have the capacity to meet all the needs of our pupils.
At Bailey Street Alternative Provision Academy, we are committed to developing and maintaining positive emotional and mental health and general wellbeing in our school community for both pupils and their families. We firmly believe that happy, secure pupils learn more effectively and are more confident and motivated with their studies.
However, we recognise that feeling happy and secure at all times can be challenging for some pupils and that all of us can experience changes in our general wellbeing for a range of reasons. Because of this, we promote a culture where all members of the school community feel valued and supported and all feel able to share concerns where they arise.
We promote this culture through:
- High quality teaching and pupil support
- Positive interactions between staff, pupils and home
- Our pastoral support system which includes: tutors, Safeguarding Leads, SENCo , the Education Welfare Officer (EWO), mentors and members of the Leadership Team
- Extensive liaison with external services, where appropriate, to ensure that, as far as possible, pupils receive the support that they need
- PSHE lessons which is constantly reviewed and update to reflect our pupils needs
- Assemblies and tutor activities which focus on well-being and key aspects of safeguarding
- Information shared in the termly newsletter and on the school website
- HR processes within the school
- Staff training to assist staff in identifying mental health warning signs and advising them on best practice strategies
A spoken word piece with a powerful message of the benefits of being in the moment which may be useful to anyone feeling anxious about returning to work after the Easter break.
my brain and
heart divorced
a decade ago
over who was
to blame about
how big of a mess
I have become
eventually,
they couldn’t be
in the same room
with each other
now my head and heart
share custody of me
I stay with my brain
during the week
and my heart
gets me on weekends
they never speak to one another
– instead, they give me
– the same note to pass
– to each other every week
and their notes they
send to one another always
says the same thing:
“This is all your fault”
on Sundays
my heart complains
about how my
head has let me down
in the past
and on Wednesday
my head lists all
of the times my
heart has screwed
things up for me
in the future
they blame each
other for the
state of my life
there’s been a lot
of yelling – and crying
so,
lately, I’ve been
spending a lot of
time with my gut
who serves as my
unofficial therapist
most nights, I sneak out of the
window in my ribcage
and slide down my spine
and collapse on my
gut’s plush leather chair
that’s always open for me
~ and I just sit sit sit sit
until the sun comes up
last evening,
my gut asked me
if I was having a hard
time being caught
between my heart
and my head
I nodded
I said I didn’t know
if I could live with
either of them anymore
“my heart is always sad about
something that happened yesterday
while my head is always worried
about something that may happen tomorrow,”
I lamented
my gut squeezed my hand
“I just can’t live with
my mistakes of the past
or my anxiety about the future,”
I sighed
my gut smiled and said:
“in that case,
you should
go stay with your
lungs for a while,”
I was confused
– the look on my face gave it away
“if you are exhausted about
your heart’s obsession with
the fixed past and your mind’s focus
on the uncertain future
your lungs are the perfect place for you
there is no yesterday in your lungs
there is no tomorrow there either
there is only now
there is only inhale
there is only exhale
there is only this moment
there is only breath
and in that breath
you can rest while your
heart and head work
their relationship out.”
this morning,
while my brain
was busy reading
tea leaves
and while my
heart was staring
at old photographs
I packed a little
bag and walked
to the door of
my lungs
before I could even knock
she opened the door
with a smile and as
a gust of air embraced me
she said
“what took you so long?”