(Atlantic) As part of the Atlantic Community School District’s strategic plan to create a positive climate, the Atlantic School Board on Wednesday approved funding for the “Happiness Advantage Staff Training.”
Atlantic Schools Superintendent Steve Barber says the staff will engage in the training on their first day back in the classroom on August 18.
Six years ago, 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. The latter stayed at the institution and developed this positive psychology program. Williams said Achor noticed that many Harvard students became unhappy and often depressed after a couple of months, and he began studying this.
According to the book authored by Shawn Achor and conventional wisdom, once we succeed, we’ll be happy; once we get that great job, win that next promotion, and 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.
