Positive Education

Positive Education is a foundational framework we employ at DCSPD. It seeks to ensure that relationships between students and teachers, between peers, and between the teachers and parents are robust and positive, creating an environment where everyone can achieve their best.

Positive Education is a movement that has been gathering momentum for many years now. It comes in response to the key insight that whilst it is easy for schools to quantify students' academic achievement, it is more difficult to identify the qualities which are required behind these achievements.

Over the last few years, we have engaged with industry leading experts in Positive Education who have provided important input so that our Positive Education framework is uniquely adapted to our College.

Positive Education is an education model that combines positive psychology and teaching. It includes skills such as helping students shape excellent interpersonal relationships, build strong, positive emotions, enhance personal adaptability, promote mindfulness, and learn healthy lifestyles online and offline. The result is that our students have the skills to nurture their own happiness and gain a sense of personal accomplishment.

Positive Education at DCSPD creates an environment that makes children happy and safe, and it promotes a positive and healthy culture among students, teachers, and parents. The focus is not only on education but on all aspects of school life and our college community.

An important element of Positive Education is creating an environment where student voice is not only heard but valued and acted upon. Student voice at DCSPD impacts not only what is taught and how it is taught but it informs College policy. This is true from our Early Years programme in DUCKS to our IBDP programme in Years 12 and 13.

In this way Positive Education not only it gives students ownership over their own wellbeing, it gives them a sense of belonging to the community, and real empowerment which they take with them long after graduation.

DCSPD students understand that when they really want to pursue something, everyone around them can give support, but to really get results, they have to put in the effort, make mistakes, and learn from them. This happens best in a supportive atmosphere. In the end, they learn to solve problems in real life and achieve success.

Positive Education is not about avoiding negative emotions, rather accepting that negative emotions are part of life. At DCSPD Positive Education does not mean insulating students in an artificial vacuum away from the real world. Instead, we try to create an environment where everyone feels safe so they can explore who they are and what really matters to them.

Finally, Positive Education does not come at the expense of high achievement whether in academics, sport or the arts. Scientific research has shown that when in a state of anxiety and tension, the brain cannot enter the optimal learning mode. The more relaxed and happier you are, the more you can learn. This is why we do everything possible to eliminate "anxiety" in school.

We are happy to say that the results speak for themselves. Our students continue to excel in the IB. They achieve remarkable results in whichever passion they choose to pursue. They are highly attractive to the world's most prestigious universities, but most importantly they are empowered with the skills and motivation to make a positive difference in the world.

Learn more about our Whole College aproach to Wellbeing right here.