EAST LONGMEADOW – Though students often associate the first week back to school with dread, East Longmeadow High School (ELHS) students have nothing to worry about. This week, Principal Gina Flanagan along with the schools’ staff has prepared a fun week of team building and collaboration–no bad vibes allowed.

“Good Vibes Only,” is this year’s theme at ELHS, said Flanagan, noting that with the growth in students facing stress, anxiety, mental health issues and drug and alcohol abuse, the school system is taking a deliberate and direct approach to supporting students.

“We wanted to send a message to the student that we really care about you and want your journey here to be a successful one,” she explained. “”Good Vibes Only” is a big time catch phrase right now, it just seemed to fit what we’re trying to capture.”

Students will be welcomed on their first day back, August 28, by all faculty members and staff standing outside the school wearing matching red “Good Vibes Only” t-shirts. Flanagan said the staff greeting the students is all apart of the schools desire to build positive relationships this year.

This first day and often the first week of school is generally dedicated to reading through syllabuses, passing out books and going over classroom common practices. This year, however, ELHS teachers were asked to focus on developing a positive class culture by facilitating activities with students that foster trust, collaboration, ownership and kindness.

“We thought, let’s invest the time up front to get to know our students to create a positive classroom with the hopes that if we create that up front, the kids will feel safer in school and take risks in the classroom and hopefully treat each other with a little more kindness themselves,” Flanagan said. “The first two days [of school] is culture building within the classroom and throughout the school. Teachers do these things anyway, but we’re making them more deliberate and a direct message to our students that we want to be apart of their success here.”

Flanagan continued, sharing that on August 30, each grade level will have the opportunity to take part in workshops and activities that individually suit the grades’ needs. Freshmen students will be focusing on activities that focus on the transition from Middle School to High School. Sophomore students will be concentrating on building a mindset to make healthy decisions.

Flanagan explained sophomore student activities stating, “That’s the age where kids can start to veer off. We have workshops on how to maintain healthy relationships with family or with significant others and healthy decision making.”

Juniors will be focusing on college and career activities. Not only will these students have the opportunity to do postsecondary planning, they will also take part in role–playing activities that give them networking experience.

ELHS seniors will be going to Pine Knoll Golf Course in town, where they will be able to bond amongst themselves and their educators.

Later in the day on the 30th after students have participated in their respective activities, there will be a school–wide carnival, complete with a DJ, inflatables and games to celebrate the Spartan community and start the year off with good vibes.

“It’s a celebration of the school year and getting everyone in a great state of mind and that when we’re all in this together, it’s a reminder that when a student falls there’s going to be people to pick them back up again. We’re going to give our kids the emotional support to be successful,” Flanagan said of her students.

While she’s proud of how strong ELHS is academically, noting that no students failed their MCAS tests this year, she wants to emphasize that not only is the Spartan community an academically successful school, but a school that focuses on the whole child.

“The past couple of years we’ve really been trying to increase the students voice and listening to them in what their needs are and what means something to them,” she said. “It is a continuation of what we care about and what the students say, their opinions matter, and really making sure that we show we’re meeting the needs of the whole child. It’s so much more than tests and homework.

“There’s a lot of scary things going on in the world, and I personally think that the school is a great way to catch those students who are struggling and try to make sure they’re in a better place so they can be better people.”