One student. Everybody writes for the same family. You pick the framework, and that is what will make our letters different.
A blank notification letter is a form document, not a student record. The moment a real student goes in, so do [Student] and [Parent].
One framework today, and it belongs to the people hosting this conference. The NDPC and SPN Trauma-Skilled Schools Model says plainly that its purpose includes making sure the school is not itself an unintentional source of trauma. A letter is one of the places that gets decided.
You do not need the whole PDF. This is the part that judges a letter.
The NDPC Trauma-Skilled Schools Model identifies five essential resiliency factors that trauma-impacted students are often deficient in:
Connection. Every student should have at least one connection with a positive, caring adult who is committed to adding value to the student.
Security. School should be a place where students are accepted, understood, and safe. Rituals, routine, and a sense of predictability and belonging are key.
Achievement. Every student needs a sense of achievement. A strengths-based approach, rather than a deficiency orientation, builds this.
Autonomy. Students of trauma often feel trapped, helpless, and out of control. Options and choices build an internal locus of control.
Fulfillment. Awareness of and concern for others. Students need opportunities to assist and meet the needs of others.
The model also states that its purpose includes making sure that school personnel and the school as an organization are not an unintentional source of trauma, and do not add to trauma that already exists.
Use these factors to judge anything I give you. Tell me which resiliency factors a piece of communication builds and which ones it works against, and quote the exact sentence each time.
Pine Hollow High School. Early November.
Amari Wells, 10th grade. Twelve absences so far this year, which crosses our threshold. The absences are scattered, with no clear pattern anyone has spotted. Amari is passing every class.
Amari lives with a father, Mr. Wells, who works a day shift. The phone number on file is current. The address on file is current. There has been no contact with the family at all this year, by anyone.
This is the first letter. Nothing has gone home yet.
Everything you change in the next ten minutes is one of these.
Aim for grade 6. Short sentences, common words, one idea at a time.
Reporting a problem, or asking a question? "We noticed" opens. "Our records indicate" closes.
A translated bureaucratic letter is still a bureaucratic letter.
Letter, text, call, or a person. Same content, very different odds.
Write the letter Pine Hollow should send to Mr. Wells. Not a revision of the one you saw. Yours.
You sent your letter on November 5. It is now November 20.
Nobody called. Nobody wrote back. Amari has missed two more days since the letter went out, bringing the total to fourteen. The letter was not returned by the post office, so as far as anyone knows it arrived.
One new detail from the front office: the phone number on file rings, but there is no voicemail set up on it.
Silence is information. It usually means the message did not arrive, did not get read, or did not feel safe to answer. Sending the same letter again, louder, addresses none of those.