NSH Hosts National Experts
As part of maintaining our national accreditation by the Alliance of Psychoanalytic Schools, NSH is visited by national experts from other therapeutic schools with a mission of helping bright children achieve their potential in school and life. On February 20 and 21, we were treated to a consultation from Dr. Thomas Barrett and Denia Barrett from the Cleveland Center for Child Research and Development. Dr. Barrett is the Executive Director and Clinical Director of the Center and of the Hanna Perkins School, the oldest of the schools with a mission similar to ours. He is also on the faculty of CASE Medical School in Cleveland. His wife Denia is a family help and child therapist at the Center and the Hanna Perkins School.
We had a busy and productive two days together. We began Wednesday evening with a dinner and sharing hour attended by child therapists, counselors from other schools, other professionals interested in our work, and our own teachers and parent helpers. After dinner, Dr. Tom Barrett gave a talk entitled, “Manic Defenses Against Loneliness in Adolescence.” It was followed by a lively group discussion about the ways NSH faculty and parent helpers work together to identify children in our school whose behavior may be understood as attempts to ward off lonely feelings.
Thursday morning began bright and early with the Barretts attending our regular 7:30 meeting where children were discussed who are in need of particular care and attention at this time. The Barretts were helpful in suggesting techniques they had found effective in their own school.
The Barretts then moved on to visiting each of our classrooms to study the ways our wonderful teacher help our older children. This was of special interest to the Barretts as we are the only school in the Alliance that accepts children beyond kindergarten. They were equally impressed by our teachers and our students. An article will be forth-coming in an issue of the NSH GAZETTE written by a student selected to interview Mrs. Barrett.
Parent Helpers and the Barretts met over lunch to discuss the unique role that professional “helpers of parents” play at all Alliance Schools. We know that parents are the cornerstone of any effective plan to help children and are grateful that our consultants from Cleveland could help us with this unique task.
The day ended with an afternoon discussion where teachers, parent helpers, and therapy group leaders each presented their unique perspectives on how we can help individual children. The Barretts were able to offer suggestions based on their own experience on how we can refine our efforts. It was impressive to see that the expression “it takes a village” truly comes alive at The New School in the Heights. By time we identified all the individuals at our school who help an individual child, there was no one left in the “audience.”
We are grateful to our professional colleagues who took the time to participate in our two-day workshop with Tom and Denia. We also appreciate NSH parents and students who adjusted their school day for this event.
We plan to continue our collaboration with the Hanna Perkins Center and School in the coming months, particularly over how we can use long-distance learning to train ourselves and others in our successful techniques for helping children. |
Arthur J. Farley, M.D., the Clinical Director of The New School in the Heights will co-lead the discussion about this fascinating topic. Attendance is free, and CEU credit is avaialble. 
Each year The New School in the Heights has a Winter Festival. This year’s theme was Leonardo Da Vinci. Throughout the semester students studied about this Renaissance man in class during “Leonardo’s Workshop.” The projects were multi-leveled so that all the students from Kindergarten to Ninth grade could participate at an age appropriate level.
New Middle School students take the Stanford Achievement Test (SAT) every other year to make sure they are learning the material they will need in mainstream schools once they transition from NSH. We also do this to reassure those people who worry that if we spend time carefully fostering children's social-emotional needs, they won't succeed academically. (We think it's just the opposite.)
