Pt 2: (ProSocial) Principles that we Practice
The principles that guide us towards “working together” in the service of our at-risk youth, comes from a model called “ProSocial.” This approach, grounded in evolutionary science and contextual behavioral science, is inspired by Elinor Ostrom’s Nobel Prize winning work on the essential ingrendents that make for successfull groups: how people from different backgrounds can come together and solve complex problems. Our practices that we employ, which we intend to reflect the ProSocial Core Design Principles (CDPs), are only effective if they bring us closer to what’s important to our work: to teach at-risk youth the skills they need to be successful within the social, emotional, and behavioral domains. Further, our practices must be flexible and adaptive in meeting the needs of the organization, and the functions they are trying to fulfill. Therefore, the systems and structures that shape our “working together” must be “change-able". For example, if our meeting format does not work to inspire purposeful inclusive-decision making (CDP #3), then it must change. If the skills we are trying to teach staff and students cannot be identified by 80% of our staff body, we need to assess whether we have effective practices that strengthen CFP #1 and CDP #2. In the below table, you can see Atlantic Academy’s working model in how we are attempting to realize the CDPs.
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For more information about Prosocial, visit https://www.prosocialinstitute.org/