Why B.R.A.V.E.?
B.R.A.V.E. is our student leadership program focused on 1) student empowerment, 2) empathy activation, and 3) building the Core Human Skills to sustain healthy relationships, build stronger support networks, and have a positive impact on the social determinants of health. It is designed to take young student leaders who can impact their school and build a culture and community of H.O.P.E. and Action through peer modeling, mentorship, and influence.
Bravery is perhaps the greatest skill children have lost with the gross reduction in play. According to Aristotle, being brave (possessing constant and consistent courage) is one of the greatest virtues! To be brave is to be ready or prepared to face and endure danger, fear, or difficulty; it is the possession of courage or courageous endurance.
Courage is the mental or moral strength to take action and venture into the unknown, persevere, and withstand danger, fear, or difficulty (stress).
Life-long leadership
Learn useful, life-long skills! The B.R.A.V.E. Youth Leadership System covers a wide range of topics. Learn how to become a Circle expert, understand how the brain learns best, and gather strategies around leadership that will last a lifetime!
Build powerful relationships! The B.R.A.V.E. Youth Leadership System is all about relationships. Develop new connections with your fellow B.R.A.V.E. students, and even cultivate relationships with younger peers through age-mixed learning!
Take control of your own education! The B.R.A.V.E. Youth Leadership System is built around a self-directed, self-controlled, student-led environment and project-based material that gives YOU the power to focus on your interests and your autonomy!
Most importantly, have fun! Taking the fun out of education might be called abuse! Everyone loves to have fun, and the B.R.A.V.E. Youth Leadership System makes this the foundation of our program with our original Bully Drills, Circle Activators, and much more!
From day one, the Sweethearts & Heroes message has empowered our youth to be the change the world needs. S.T.E.P. (Student-Teacher Empathy Program) is our B.R.A.V.E. Youth Leadership System transitionary course. It takes our foundational K-2 and 3-5 grade messages and trains high school students to deliver them in a small group classroom format.
This is a yearlong program for student leaders or influencers across various social groups. These students can become your primary candidates and team leaders for future B.R.A.V.E. leadership programs. Our S.T.E.P. course and team trainers will help your students tailor this message to their superpowers. This program is designed to spark the next generation to be the change while building relationships across ages, setting up the crux of our youth leadership programs and age-mixed learning.
Where to start?
Experiential Learning
The B.R.A.V.E. experiential learning curriculum and system is built on spaced repetition. It gradually builds sustainable skills, embedding our methodology into school culture at every grade and age-group. Starting from simple Bully Drills and B.R.A.V.E. Circles, students progress yearly through new B.R.A.V.E. lessons focused on leadership values, social-emotional growth, and taking compassionate action. The goal is a school-wide cascade effect, where students learn collaboratively across ages. As students advance through the years, they eventually lead and administer the B.R.A.V.E. system for younger peers. Within a few years, the methodology reaches every student. All will know what it means to become BRAVE and serve as someone’s Sweetheart & Hero.
Most of us have no idea what’s going on inside our heads. How do we learn? What exactly do sleep and stress do to our brains? Why is it so easy to forget - and so important to repeat new information? In Brain Rules, molecular biologist Dr. John Medina shares his lifelong interest in how the brain sciences might influence the way we teach our children and the way we work.
We’ve all seen the happiness on a child’s face while playing in the schoolyard. Or the blissful abandon of a golden retriever racing across a lawn. This is the joy of play. By definition, play is purposeless, all-consuming, and fun. But as Dr. Stuart Brown illustrates, play is anything but trivial. It is a biological drive as integral to our health as sleep or nutrition. We are designed by nature to flourish through play.
Marvel at the neuroscientific reasons why smart teens make dumb decisions! Behold the mind-controlling power of executive function! Whether you're a parent interacting with one adolescent or a teacher interacting with many, you know teens can be hard to parent and even harder to teach. The eye-rolling, the moodiness, the wandering attention, the drama - it’s not you; it’s them. It’s their brains.
Bruce Brier, physical educator and wrestling coach at Warwick High, is on the verge of resigning after losing one of his athletes to suicide. But a mysterious janitor offers an answer to everyone’s burning question: why did Bruce's star athlete take his own life? With 13 principles for life and learning, your B.R.A.V.E. youth leaders will learn what it means to be an affective human being.
Programs & Classes
Our B.R.A.V.E. 6-week (one day per week for six consecutive weeks) focuses on creating a self-directed, self-controlled, student-led learning environment. We’ll work through the five Core Human Skills and implement vital age-mixed play-based learning.
Our B.R.A.V.E. JRs program is about helping 8th graders transition to high school as positive and responsible leaders. We want to help these young adults realize it’s okay NOT to grow up too quickly and that they can still access their youth and play as they advance to high school.
This yearlong class utilizes Self-Determination Theory (SDT) and Basic Psychological Needs Theory (BPNT) to educate students on six core modules - Circles, Bully Drills, Empathy, Brain Rules, Leadership, and Play as these students build powerful relationships.
B.R.A.V.E. 101 graduates will become experts in Circle, dive deep into Human Skills (the five core competencies), and reflect on the development of adolescents as they work with 8th graders, helping them understand what their brains are going through.
B.R.A.V.E. 103 seniors will help transition 9th-grade freshmen through their first year of high school by imparting their ‘expensive’ experience and sharing their journey to help guide new students and identify any who may want to join B.R.A.V.E. 101 the following year.