Mental Health Trainings Continue for Early Childhood Educators

During the height of the pandemic, Milwaukee’s Early Childhood Education (ECE) Coalition, in conjunction with community partners, facilitated mental health trainings for hundreds of providers, equipping them with crucial skills in the areas of stress management and trauma-informed care. Now, thanks to a generous grant from the Greater Milwaukee Foundation, these trainings are set to reach even more of Milwaukee’s ECE providers.

These trainings, presented by Wellpoint (formerly SaintA), help promote the well-being of both educators and the children they care for. Over the course of three virtual sessions (available in Spanish and English), educators come to understand the stress response and the prevalence of trauma amongst children, while also learning strategies to promote regulation, healing and resilience. The series culminates in an in-person event, where educators receive a toolkit of resources and a book of over 60 activities to use in their classrooms.

The spring sessions begin March 12, with trainings continuing through June 25. (If you’re a provider interested in participating, download the flyer to learn more.)

According to Sara Daniel, Wellpoint’s Vice President of Educational Services, “This type of training is important, especially in ECE, because we have access to the tiniest little developing brains in our city. So understanding how stress impacts those brains and how positive or negative adaptations to that stress play a role in the trajectory of someone’s life is really important. If we can influence that in a way that we develop positive coping strategies and adaptations, we can really change people’s lives for the long-term.”