POSITIVE ATTITUDES WILL SUCCEED
Eyer Middle School is part of an East Penn middle level program committed to fostering and encouraging positive behavior. In an effort to further our commitment, we developed a positive behavior program known as PAWS (Positive Attitudes Will Succeed). Initially, Eyer was awarded a grant from PBIS to start our PAWS program. Positive Behavior Intervention Support – PBIS is a nationally recognized program designed to foster and encourage positive behavior. The grant has since expired, but our PAWS program continues to thrive.
At Eyer, we pride ourselves on our nurturing, positive culture, and we enthusiastically implement our PAWS program, focusing of good behavior and positive character attributes. Recognizing students for good behavior is a method used to decrease the number of discipline incidents, including bullying. We have a core of teachers, administrators, counselors, parents and students that meet once a month to evaluate progress and plan events. We have a software package that enables us to enter discipline data, and allows us to analyze types, frequency, and location of incidents. During quarterly meetings, we monitor progress made in the area of discipline and bullying.
Our faculty has designed our PAWS program specifically to be ‘Eyer friendly.’ We developed our program with the goal of enthusiastically involving everyone, making our positive behavior system a collaborative effort. The acronym for our program is PAWS – Positive Attitudes Will Succeed. The title of the program aligns with our school mascot, the bulldog. Every pod and many areas in the school have PAWS posters and banners, making our program message very visible and generating a positive atmosphere.
Each team/Pod of teachers meets periodically to develop individual team ideas to support and further our PAWS initiative. We also continue to improve our school-wide plan to generate student enthusiasm, and by so doing, improve our school culture. One way in which we have done this is to include students on our PAWS committee, soliciting their feedback and ideas to enhance our program.
Both our students and teachers take great pride in our program. Parents are encouraged to ask their children about how they are doing with their collection of PAWS stickers. A PAWS committee meets monthly to renew the commitment to the program and to schedule school-wide events for PAWS. Enthusiasm remains high for the program and the atmosphere at Eyer continues to thrive.
Our school plan revolves around PAWS stickers that students will earn and place on a PAWS sticker page in their assignment book.
There are many ways a student may earn a PAWS sticker:
1) All Students of the Month will receive 3 stickers
2) All students that are in a homeroom can earn incentive points by: returning FYI’s; good behavior on the bus, in the cafeteria, in the hallways; etc…
3) Every adult in the building – teachers, cafeteria workers, aides, administration, bus drivers, custodians – will have stickers so they can award them to any student they see performing PAWS-like behavior.
4) Periodically, we will call a “PAWS Check” on the loudspeaker. At this time, all teachers will check that students have all the required materials for that class. If they do, the student will receive a PAWS sticker.
PAWS INCENTIVES
In sixth grade, when a student has collected 25 stickers, they will exchange them for one of our specially designed PAWS shirts. Over time, more and more students earn these shirts. All adults in the building will are given a shirt, and on Fridays, all adults and students that have earned a shirt will wear them with pride. New students are also given the opportunity to earn a shirt so that all students have ample opportunity to achieve the goal.
In addition to earning PAWS t-shirts, each quarter students will submit their PAWS sticker page to have their total counted. Each quarter, a specific number of students from each Pod will be chosen, based on their total of PAWS stickers, to participate in a fun event.
Events include:
- Pool Party Fundraiser (First week of school – open to ALL students)
- PAWS Tailgate (Fall)
- PAWS Bowling trip (Winter)
- PAWS Pancake Breakfast (Winter)
- PAWS Ice Cream Social (Spring)
- PAWS Pool Party (End of Year)
Other events and activities may be periodically added throughout the year. Also, there is an activity period (9th period) known as Dog Pound, where students with a minimum number of PAWS stickers, set by PODS, can participate in a schedule of athletic events on a weekly basis.