A Comprehensive Approach: How Winchester Thurston uses #WinAtSocial and RULER to support academic success and strong school culture
School: Winchester Thurston School
Location: Pittsburgh, PA
Grades Served: 6th-8th
Key Outcomes: Improved emotional regulation, healthier school-wide tech habits, decreased disciplinary issues, and a stronger school community.
About Winchester Thurston School: Winchester Thurston’s mission is to cultivate not only academic excellence, but also the development of individuals with unwavering character, valuing the well-being and rights of others above all else. By using #WinAtSocial, they support their strategic direction of empowering students to live in high-character ways that support their learning and well-being.
“We want our kids to be intellectually curious. We want them to be purpose-driven.”
– Pete Mathis, Director of Middle School
The Challenge: Supporting Students’ Academic Success and Well-Being in the Modern Day
Winchester Thurston’s vision is centered on flexibility and community support, not just completing a checklist. They knew that preparing students for a successful future meant going beyond their existing curriculum to shape students who are responsible, good citizens.
To better understand how Winchester Thurston was bringing this vision to life, The Social Institute huddled with Pete Mathis, Director of the Middle School, to hear what led them to look for a proactive, student-led modern life skills program like #WinAtSocial.
“Our kids look to us [adults] for everything that we do from a behavior standpoint. What we say, what we do — they look to us for advice. So we’re teaching them more than academics, and that kind of led right into us thinking about how we can support our students and what programs are out there that can do this.”
Like many school communities, Winchester Thurston also recognized that students today are navigating an increasingly tech-driven world. While students may be native to tools like social media and A.I., Pete knew they still needed guidance to make thoughtful choices and use tech intentionally, bringing them to #WinAtSocial: A comprehensive approach, co-created with K-12 students, that empowers healthy decision making, online and offline.
The Solution: A Tailored, Three-Tier Approach to Community, Emotional Intelligence, and Healthy Tech Habits
Winchester Thurston already had a strong foundation through advisory structures that build community and Yale’s RULER curriculum, that provide students with a shared language for emotional regulation. But Winchester Thurston recognized the need for a bridge that would help students apply those skills in the digital spaces where real-world decisions are increasingly made.
By integrating #WinAtSocial, the school enhanced its tiered approach and empowers students to translate emotional intelligence, self-awareness, and values-based decision-making into their experiences with tech, like social media and artificial intelligence. This connection ensures students are learning skills and putting them into practice where influence, pressure, and choice show up most.
Tier 1: Advisory for Community Building
Winchester Thurston’s foundation begins with daily advisory structures designed to strengthen relationships and build belonging across grade levels. By creating this space, Winchester Thurston has a safe place for students to huddle, ask questions, stay curious, and build community.
Tier 2: RULER for Emotional Regulation
To help students better understand and express their feelings, the school implemented RULER, which stands for Recognize, Understand, Label, Express, and Regulate:
“RULER grounded us in giving kids the language and skills necessary to identify and regulate their emotions. We have morning meetings once a week, and we incorporate all of this work, make it visible, and we break down a letter of RULER each month.”
Pete emphasized that the school makes this work visible and intentional through consistent routines and shared language.“If it’s important, make it intentional, and that’s what we’re doing with this work, we’re making it intentional.”
Tier 3: #WinAtSocial: The Key for Preparing Future-Ready Students
Winchester Thurston married #WinAtSocial with RULER to help students apply emotional intelligence and decision-making skills in the online spaces where many real-world challenges arise.
“I look at #WinAtSocial and the Social Institute as allowing our kids to translate that language into the digital world and have fluency within that world, right? So, using the tools and tricks in the toolboxes that #WinAtSocial has allows them to have that internal conversation with themselves when they’re regulating their emotions.”
With #WinAtSocial Lessons, students practice navigating challenges they may experience with A.I., group chat dynamics, social media, and more — not through fear or restriction, but through positive and proactive guidance. “Just like anything, they need practice with it. They need guidance. They need to fail at it and learn from it.”
Together, Pete described this combination as a successful approach to supporting student learning and well-being:
“Marrying RULER with the emotional intelligence, along with #WinAtSocial, was just the winning combination on top of the fact that we have our advisory program that really works on building community and those in-person relationships.”
The Impact: A Stronger Culture of Reflection, Agency, and Support
Since implementing this approach, Winchester Thurston saw meaningful shifts in how students communicate, reflect, and support one another, both online and offline. By equipping students with the fundamental language to regulate their emotions through RULER, and giving them opportunities to practice and apply it in a safe, engaging way through #WinAtSocial, the school helped students build the confidence to navigate real-world challenges in healthy ways.
“We wanted to normalize these conversations early and upfront so that our kids felt comfortable approaching us about these topics, seeking help for it, and anticipating what we call kind of digital dilemmas.”
Winchester Thurston also strengthened student support systems beyond the classroom through monthly wellness surveys. These surveys are supported by real-time, anonymous student data they can pull from #WinAtSocial Insights, creating consistent opportunities for students to self-advocate and ask for help when they need it.
“This allows students to really open up and ask for help when sometimes they normally wouldn’t… It’s teaching them skills of being honest and advocating for themselves.”
Over the years of using #WinAtSocial, Pete shared that the school has experienced fewer issues requiring administrator involvement. He sees this as an encouraging sign that students are learning to regulate emotions better, communicate more thoughtfully, and handle challenges before they escalate.
“In the three years we’ve been doing this, we’ve been seeing that less instances have been happening where we’ve had to intervene, whether that’s a group text message, whether that’s some drama online, and so we celebrate that as a win.”
Looking toward the future, Pete shared that Winchester Thurston’s ultimate goal is for students to carry these skills with them long after middle school. He hopes these skills will empower students to approach both online and in-person life with empathy, agency, and strong decision-making.
Equip Students with Modern Life Skills at Your School
Ready to teach healthy tech habits and strengthen emotional intelligence in your school community? Preview some of our most popular #WinAtSocial Lessons and request a demo to explore how The Social Institute can support your entire community:
- Trending Lesson for Grades 3–5: Sad thoughts turned around >
- Trending Lesson for Grades 6–8: One more scroll vs. one more goal >
- Trending Lesson for Grades 9–12: Ethics and biases in A.I. >
The Social Institute (TSI) is the leader in equipping students, families, and educators with modern life skills to impact learning, well-being, and students’ futures. Through #WinAtSocial, our interactive, peer-to-peer learning platform, we integrate teacher PD, family resources, student voice insights, and more to empower entire school communities to make positive choices online and offline. #WinAtSocial Lessons teach essential skills while capturing student voice and actionable insights for educators. These insights help educators maintain a healthy school culture, foster high-impact teaching, and build meaningful relationships with families. Our unique, student-respected approach empowers and equips students authentically, enabling our solution to increase classroom participation and improve student-teacher relationships. Through our one-of-a-kind lesson development process, we create lessons for a variety of core and elective