Welcome to Building Developmental Assets

 in School Communities

Goals

To become familiar with the relationship between the Developmental Asset framework and school success

To begin to operationalize the framework in your school communities

Objectives

Become familiar with the connections between the asset framework and academic success

Begin to implement the framework in your school

Commit to forming and maintaining influential relationships with student

Commit to personally becoming an asset builder for the youth in their school and life

Developmental Assets

In the past, many programs attempting to change young people’s attitudes and behaviors focused on what not to do ( e.g. drink use drugs, become involved in violence).   Risk Factors   This strategy of reducing risks has had mixed success.

Risk Factors

• Family

History, management, attitudes, low expectations

• Peer

Alienation, friends, attitudes, early first use

• School

Policy, availability, labeling, moving, failure, involvement, truancy

• Community

Poverty, involvement, availability, norms

The Developmental Assets framework takes a different tack: It focuses not on what not to do but on what to do,  not on how not to do something negative but on how to do something positive.  The philosophy of Developmental Assets is the emphasis on nurturing positive attitudes, behaviors, skills and abilities.

Developmental Assets are like ‘building blocks” – behaviors, attitudes, experiences, and values that help young people to grow up healthy, caring, and responsible.

• Just because young people may have financial assets – e.g., they come from a well-to-do family – it doesn’t necessarily follow that they have Developmental Assets.
• The list of 40 assets isn’t necessarily complete; these assets are merely the ones that so far have been corroborated in the research by Search Institute.

Categories of Developmental Assets

External Assets

• Support
• Empowerment
• Boundaries and Expectations
• Constructive Use of Time

Internal Assets

• Commitment to Learning
• Positive Values
• Social Competencies
• Positive Identity

(The Asset Approach: Giving Kids What They Need to Succeed) Brochure page 2)

“External Assets” are the relationships and opportunities that are provided to young people

“Internal Assets” are the values and skills that young people develop to guide themselves. 

An Asset Checklist

(Insert Asset Checklist here)

 Identify which of the assets you had when you were growing up- about 15-16 years old.  For example, if your neighbors encouraged and supported you as a young person, put a check by #4.  If you feel you told the truth even when it wasn’t easy, put a check by #29.  Remember, these are the assets you experienced when you were growing up. 

Circle the assets that you think were especially powerful for you.  Maybe your parents continuously modeled positive, responsible behavior, and that was an inspiration to you to do the same.  If that was the case, then circle # 14.  Or maybe you were always optimistic about your personal future, and that got you through a lot of tough situations.  If that was the case, then circle # 40.

Don’t worry if it turns out that you don’t think you had very many assets when you were growing up.  Some people – young and old – lead successful lives without having the benefit of a large number of assets.  These people are resilient, and if you’re one of them, you should be proud of what you’ve accomplished.  And don’t compare the number of your assets with others.

All assets aren’t created equal for each person, so a comparison isn’t going to be very meaningful. 

Find an individual who is different from you, like a different sex, age, or race.  Share some of the assets you selected.  See if you have any assets in common; you’d be surprised at how so-called different people are similar in many ways. 

Discuss as a group what made a difference for people. 

• People have experienced a variety of assets, and few have experienced all of them.
• Young people also experience and have the potential to experience a variety of assets.
• For that reason, it’s important to try to build a variety of assets and not to focus on just one or two.

The checklist that was used is only an informal tool.  The assets of over a million young people have been formally measured using the Search Institute Profiles of Student Life: Attitudes and Behaviors survey.  Data supports that building Developmental Assets has some concrete implications.

The Power of Assets

Building Assets is associated with not only reducing high-risk behaviors but also with improving students’ academic and overall school performance

(Transparencies  - Positive Outcomes  High Risk Behaviors)

Review the charts.  Building assets not only promotes positive behaviors, but also protects young people from negative behaviors.  The more assets a young person has, the more positive behaviors and the fewer high-risk behaviors that a young person will show.  Building assets has multiple benefits.

(Transparency Academic Achievement and Assets and Handout Insights and Evidence: Boosting Student Achievement)

(Handouts – The Power of Developmental Assets and Insights and Evidence Boosting Student Achievement)

(Handout – Percentage of Youth Who Report Experiencing the DA That Schools Can Most Directly Affect)

Other assets may be indirectly related to academic success, but these are the ones that seem to have the highest correlation. 

• Building assets has great promise in increasing young people’s academic performance as any other single documented strategy.  For example, in a high school in St. Louis Park, Minnesota, every added asset resulted in a .2 increase in GPA.
• All target populations in the “No Child Left Behind” Act improve as the number of their assets increase.

Most schools’ missions focus on students’ achieving good grades, good health, and good character, and all three are associated with Developmental Assets. 

• Schools that build Developmental Assets also contribute to students’ success
• Schools can do better in building assets

Handouts  (The Power of Developmental Assets)  (Insights and Evidence: Boosting Student Achievement)  (Percentage of Youth Who Report Experiencing the Developmental Assets That Schools Can Most Directly Affect)

Up to now, we have been talking about changes “out there” as a concept.  Now we will discuss the changes that first have to happen inside of you).

What are some points you have just learned, want to remember and plan to share with people.

New Ways of Thinking and Being

Attitudes that help as well as those that hinder the building of Developmental Assets

(Handout – Old Attitude/New Attitude)

Review Old Attitudes/New Attitude and think of stories either from your own experience or others that exemplify each “new” attitude.

In order to transform school communities, we must first transform ourselves.  Building Developmental Assets in school communities often requires a shift in attitudes – a different way of looking at things.

Examples of schools  

(Transparency – The Asset-Building Difference)

Attitudes you are looking at represent a shift-a shift from the old to the new.  The “old” attitudes are mostly the prevailing ones, and you’ll be helping to change them.

Review a few attitude shifts.  Building Developmental Assets requires these attitude shifts in both individuals and in school-community norms.  Real change has taken place when it’s taken for granted, for example, that “young people are resources.”

Look over the list and take a minute or two to choose two attitude shifts:

• One that you think would be relatively easy for you to make, or that you believe you already have made; and
• A second that you think would be relatively difficult for you to make, for whatever reason.

Find a partner to discuss mutual responses.  How could you make those shits easier? 

• Which attitude shifts do you think would be the easiest for you to make?
• Which attitude shits do you think would be the most difficult for you to make?
• What ideas do you have to make some of these difficult shifts easier?

Consider the following points:

• These new attitudes are the first necessary step.
• These attitudes need to be promoted among the people you work with; that can come only after you incorporate the attitudes yourself.
• The way to incorporate attitudes in ourselves and to promote them in others is by being intentional – to make a deliberate effort to focus on strengths.

(Handout – What Will I Do To Build Assets?)

Complete questions 1 from “What Will I Do to Build Assets?”  This is to begin to create a plan for beginning asset building in you own school community.

Asset Builders in Our Lives

Identify people who made a difference in your own life.

What was the relationship between you and the person that was important?

(Transparency – Who Was There for You)

Recall when you were a student and think about a school adult who made a difference for you.  This adult may have been a teacher, nurse, bus driver, cafeteria worker, or anyone else in the school community who seemed to take a special interest in you.   Think about that relationship.  If you can’t think of someone, then think of someone you would like to have been there for you and what that relationship might have been like.  Write the name of that person below your own name.  Exchange stories about how those people made a difference for each of you.

What made these people special?  How did they make a difference in your life?

One of the overriding characteristics of all the stories was a respectful, caring, genuine relationship, and that’s what you want to focus on next.

A Vision of Asset Building In Action

Real-life Examples

You have been discussing Developmental Assets in general.  What do you think this looks like?  What would it look like or feel like to enter a school or classroom that was rich in Developmental Assets?  What would it sound like?  Describe it.  Be specific.

Handout (40 Developmental Assets bilingual list)

    Video or stories from books or personal stories

Everyone’s vision of an “asset-rich” school and classroom is somewhat different.  Now we are going through a process to help you create your visions of asset-rich schools and classrooms a reality.  Not everyone will build assets in the same way.

What do the best teachers do that is so powerful to build assets? Building Developmental Assets puts people in touch with why they decided to be in education. We will now illustrate the importance of individuals like you doing just that.

The Assignment Part 1

Make a positive connection with a young person or an adult.  And by ‘make a connection, I mean, say something nice to the person, engage the person in conversation, and show the person that you care and that the person is important, e.g., you appreciate the other person’s work.  You may find ideas here to help you to make your connections.  Remember, take a look at the resources you have brought with you.

Mini Poster   (150 Ways to Show Kids You Care)

The Assignment Part 2

Discuss the positive connections that you made.

What were your experiences in beginning to form a relationship with someone?

Issues:

• The ease or difficulty in talking to someone, especially someone who is much younger than you
• The Consequences
• The ease or difficulty in routinely forming and maintaining influential relationships with young people

Even if we’ve have already been forming and maintaining influential relationships with young people, being more proactive may feel awkward at first.

Now you are going to be addressing inn a little more depth how to form and maintain those relationships.

Relationships

Discuss the importance of forming influential relationships with young people and plan how to do that

Video (You Have to Live It: Building Developmental Assets in School Communities) 

( Transparency -Forming Influential Relationships with Young People) 

 (Handout -Forming Influential Relationships with Young People)

Forming influential relationships with young people is at the core of building Developmental Assets because building assets is not a program or curriculum but a way of interacting with young people. When young people trust and respect adults, then they’re more likely  both to hear the positive messages adults are giving to them and then to act on them.

Section of Video – “Relationships”

Points to Ponder:

• Forming asset-rich relationships with young people provides a forum for building assets for and with those young people
• Forming asset-rich relationships with young people changes the norm from seeing young people as problems to fix or chores to finish or energy to corral, to valuing young people as sources of strength, talent, and enjoyment
• Forming asset-rich relationships with young people is a way that you as an individual can make a difference in young people’s lives

Just how do we go about forming asset-rich influential relationships?

(Transparency – Forming Influential Relationships with Young People)

(Handout – Forming Influential Relationships with Young People)

Describe each of the levels of forming relationships and give examples:

• Making Connections
• Getting to Know Young People
• Identifying and Encouraging Young People’s Strength and Talents
• Challenging Young People
• Focusing on Building Specific Assets
• Maintaining Relationships

Affirmations

Select asset-building affirmations to act upon

Sticky notes      

   (Handouts Asset-Building Affirmations and What Will I Do to Build Assets?)

Take a look at the affirmation.  Affirmations like these are written in a way that assumes you’re already doing the; they put you in an “affirmative” frame of mind that motivates you to make your behavior consistent with the affirmation.

First, read the affirmations. Then choose one that you feel you can do, or else create one of your own.  Write the affirmation you’ve chosen on a sticky note.  Repeat it on each of three notes. 

Do the following:

• Every morning for at least the next week, read and visualize the affirmation you chose.  Do this in a quiet place – for example, in your car in the parking lot.
• Post the affirmations in place that will remind you to act upon them, for example, your car, refrigerator, bathroom mirror, clock or planning book.  You may want to put one affirmation where you will see it first in the morning, another where you will see at lunch, and a third where you will see it on the way home.
• Act upon your affirmation for at least a week
• Finally, share your affirmation with the people you work with.  This is not only a public declaration of your intentions but also an opportunity for you to ask for whatever support would help you keep to those affirmations. 

Refer to “What Will I Do to Build Assets?”  Answer questions # 2, 3 and 4. Think of young people whose names you wrote down in question #3, and anticipate situations in which you could build the assets you identified.

(Handout pages from Great Places to Learn – pp 128,142, 158)

These charts "Create Your Own Stories” from Great Places to Learn list the stories cited in that chapter of the book and also gives reader ideas for creating their own stories.  Review the ideas while you complete the questions.

Promoting assets doesn’t mean ignoring inappropriate behavior.  The next thing you will be doing is discussing how to influence appropriate behaviors while promoting assets.

Influencing Appropriate Behavior

Learn a way to influence a young person’s appropriate behaviors while promoting assets

Some ways of influencing such behaviors are more effective than others, and using a strategy based on the asset approach is likely to be effective. 

(Handout - Grading Grownups 2002)

Many more adults say they point out positive things about young people than young people think they do. What does that tell you about how we might go about influencing young people’s appropriate behaviors?  Focusing on the positive attributes of young people will be an effective strategy.

What kinds of inappropriate student behavior do you see around your school? 

(Handout- Influencing Appropriate Behavior)

Review the steps.  Pair up with someone. Choose a behavior from the list.  Take turns using the strategy with each other.

• One of you is the adult and the other the student.  Students tell the adults how old they are before they begin.  Switch after the first role play.
• Those play the role of students choose the inappropriate behavior before beginning the role play – a behavior that’s relatively easy to address
• Adults think about what positive attribute they can mention before beginning the role play.

Questions:

• Did anyone have any difficulty role playing? 

-Solutions to difficulties?

   - Does anyone have any suggestions for making    

    the strategy more effective?

• Where are some places, and when are some

  Times that you can see using this strategy?

• Find another partner and role-play twice more, once in each role. This time, find a more difficult situation

• Focus on obstacles and solutions
• Commit to using the strategy the next time you see inappropriate behavior by a student

Environment

Identify specific strategies to make your person environment more conductive to building assets

Book (Pass It On! Ready-to-Use Handouts for Asset Builders)

Easel and Titled Sheets

• In My Office
• In My Classroom
• With My Colleagues
• With Students
• With Students’ Parents and Other Family Members
• With My Own Family and Friends

The most common characteristic of a caring environment is caring people. 

• Think about a business you really enjoy patronizing – business that really seem to care for their customers.  What is it about those environments that make you feel that you matter – that the business cares about you?
• What works best in your own environment – your office, your classroom?  What kind of environment helps you to feel effective and happy?
• What can we do to make our personal environments more caring, so that students feel that they matter, that the people in the school care about them?

(Handout Creating an Asset-Rich Environment)

Now you are going to think of specific ways to make your personal environments at school more conducive to building assets.  Pretend that you have the wherewithal to redesign your personal environment.  You can do it in any of six areas as represented on the sheets. 

Choose one out of the six areas of most interest to you.

Think about what specifically you would do in this area to make the personal environment more conductive to building assets.  Think creatively and don’t be limited by traditional ways of doing things.  Think of physical things you would do, emotional things, social things and so on…

Write your ideas down on the appropriate sheet.  One person will serve as recorder.

After a few minutes, you will move on to another sheet and you will have an opportunity to write your ideas on another sheet.  This will occur every five minutes.

You can copy ideas you think you will use, to complete answers to Questions # 5 and #6 on “What Will I Do to Build Assets”.

Volunteers from each group share the ideas.

Refer to these sheets for other ideas for providing an asset-rich environment.

(Handouts - Asset-Building Ideas for School Teachers - -Asset-Building Ideas for School Administrators - Asset-Building Ideas for Student Support Staff-  -Asset-Building Ideas for School Support Staff  -Asset-Building Ideas for School Bus Drivers -Asset-Building Ideas for Mentors - Asset-Building Ideas for Coaches -Strategies for Building Developmental Assets)

These ideas were taken from Pass It On! Ready-to-Use  Handouts for Asset Builders.  These can be shared with appropriate people in the school community.

Refer to “Strategies for Developmental Assets.  Use or modify these ideas.

Review

You have seen a lot of materials from Search Institute.  There are many other materials you haven’t seen. 

Projected visual presentation of the Search Institute’s website   www.search-institute.org

Student Support Specialists have many of the resources for your use.

Share visions of asset-rich school communities

Glasses – sparkling cider  

(Transparency - The Seven Neckbones of the Giraffe Project)

Review these steps.  These could be your steps to building assets in your live.  Students are accomplishing two things in the Giraffe Project: They are building assets for themselves, and they are serving their communities.  If you would like more information about the project, visit the Web site www.giraffe.org  

Everyone join in a toast for change.  This particular toast for change will be a change to a world rich with assets, a world of the future.  Please take a cup of sparkling cider, and then stand in a circle.

• One of the goals of this was to give you the tools to intentionally build assets in your personal environments.
• In order for the asset building to happen, people need to share a common vision of an asset-rich school community – with students and school adults alike building assets.
• You’d like to make the first toast for change – a toast to a future in which, for example, students can come to school knowing they’ll be cared for, valued and treated with respect and dignity.
• Would you like to make a toast?
• The real challenge of building assets comes when you are not being reminded to build assets.  For some people building assets is a real lifestyle change, and for others, it’s a way to continue doing what they usually do, only to be more intentional about it.  Either way, building assets is most effective when it is or becomes a way of life.  The plan you begin today for making your personal and professional lives asset-rich is a big step toward accomplishing that job. 

Thank you!

Fact Sheet on Search Institute

(Handout – Fact Sheet on Search Institute)