By NICK GOSNELL
Hutch Post
HUTCHINSON, Kan. — Prairie Hills Middle School in Buhler USD 313 now has a calm room for those with behavioral issues.
"We're really excited about this," said USD 313 Superintendent Cindy Couchman. "We used some of our Social-Emotional Learning money from our ESSER II funds to create a calm room for our counselors to use to have small groups. This is something new our counselors are doing this year is they are having small group sessions with a group of students. That kind of gives them a connection with each other."
That connection between students can help to alleviate some of those behavior issues, as well, but it also can help individual students in crisis.
"If a student is really having a rough day, or sometimes, you just need to be alone, let's face it," Couchman said. "This is a room that they can go to and just calm themselves down and have someone in there with them to talk them through things. It's very private. It's a great space and they are using it quite a bit already and we're excited about that."
Social-Emotional Learning is where students learn how to interact with each other responsibly and how to be aware of their own triggers and learn to calm them.
It's also important to note that the last full normal school year was three years ago, so, as an example, a seventh grader hasn't had the chance to interact normally with their peers in school for the entire year since fourth grade.