(Atlantic) The Atlantic Community School District is starting a new program this year to create a positive culture within the school district.
Five years ago, the current Atlantic School Board President Jenny Williams attended the Iowa School Board convention where school officials from Western Dubuque introduced the Orange Frog Program.
Williams says the program is a positive psychology program based on the book “The Happiness Advantage” written by Shawn Achor, a Harvard student who stayed at the institution and developed this positive psychology program. Williams said Achor noticed that after a couple of months, many Harvard students became unhappy and often depressed, and he began studying this.
So Shawn Achor teamed up with Craig Kaiser with International Thought Leadership and wrote the “Orange Frog.”
Williams attended that same convention this past year, and there was this school again (Western Dubuque) talking about all of the positive things going on in their district.
Joy stands for “Just Orange Yourself.” This group of twelve crew members may be seen dressed in orange walking down the hallway, high-fiving people, or maybe listening to someone with an issue.
According to the book, conventional wisdom holds that once we succeed, we’ll be happy; once we get that great job, win that next promotion, lose five pounds, happiness will follow. However, Achor says in the book; that science reveals this formula to be backward: in other words, Happiness fuels success, not the other way around. The book also states; research shows that happy employees are more productive, more creative, and better problem-solvers than their unhappy peers.
Williams says the Joy Crew’s Mission is…
