Teachers from 26 schools are undergoing training through the Berry Street Education Model, which aims to provide strategies to engage the most challenging students. 

School focused youth service co-ordinator Paul Taylor, who works from Bendigo Community Health Services, saw a need for the program in Bendigo, after talking to schools and teachers in the region.

“I knew that people were struggling with dealing with those kids who had been trauma-affected and this seemed like the perfect answer,” he said.

Mr Taylor worked with Berry Street and the education department to bring the program to Bendigo earlier this year, with more than 180 people from schools and community organisations signing up for the 12-month training.

It began in term three of this year and Mr Taylor said the response so far had been fantastic.

“I’ve had so much great feedback,” he said. 

“A lot of people have been looking for ideas because people generally don’t realise how many people trauma affects.

“It’s not just those kids who are really really dysfunctional and struggling. 

“There are kids from all walks of life who have suffered some sort of trauma and that can be one episode of domestic violence or it could be kids who are homeless and struggling with drug addiction.

“All those kids are trauma-affected.”

Michele Sampson, a senior trainer at Berry Street Education Model, said in adults, for each adverse childhood experience endured, medical issues tripled. 

“We give teachers strategies for self-growth and also for working with these vulnerable kids so that instead of doing that knee-jerk reaction to kids when things start to escalate, they have some strategies,” she said.

The Berry Street Education Model is split into five domains – body, relationship, stamina, engagement and character – teaching classroom and whole-school strategies to help trauma-affected students.

Teachers this week tackled the “relationship” domain and will move on to stamina and engagement next.

The final installment covers character strength and values.

“Many of our vulnerable kids have never even heard that they’ve got some strengths and so we talk about what those strengths are,” Ms Sampson said. 

“So we’re really about giving teachers strategies so they can empower kids to be ready to learn.”

The first round of the program will conclude in Bendigo in mid-2018, with both secondary and primary, and government and private schools taking part.

It is hoped more schools will take up the training in the second half of the year, extending to as far as Echuca and Kyabram.

Ms Sampson said, in an average classroom, 40 per cent of students had had a potentially traumatising stressor.

“That doesn’t mean necessarily that they are traumatised, but they’ve had some sort of event that for some kids depending on their stress-response could register as trauma in them,” she said. 

“And then in some schools that would be even higher, and some schools a little bit less.

“It’s just an eye-opener for teachers.”

Mr Taylor estimated the figure would be higher in some Bendigo schools, based on the socioeconomic makeup of the area.

“It has such a lasting impact on your life,” he said.

“Being able to work with those kids and help them achieve what they might be able to achieve if they’re embraced and taken along that journey with the teachers… I’m just happy to be able to bring that to Bendigo.”