How St. Croix Lutheran Academy uses #WinAtSocial to proactively address student challenges related to social media
Cyberbullying. Not enough sleep. Privacy concerns. K-12 schools across the country are seeing challenges from social media and tech that impact students’ ability to learn in the classroom.
According to a national survey from EdWeek Research Center, 80% of educators said students’ behavior worsens with more screen time. Screen time averages continue to rise among students, and issues from cyberbullying or group chat drama are making their way into the classroom. As a result, schools are working hard to address these challenges as they come up so that student learning and well-being are supported.
How can schools proactively address social media and tech challenges in a way that aligns with their core values and doesn’t add to teachers’ plates?
St. Croix Lutheran Academy landed on #WinAtSocial, a modern life skills approach that aligns with their biblical teachings and empowers students to use tech in high-character ways.
Adam Frey, Dean of Student Life at St. Croix, huddled with The Social Institute to discuss how they are positively impacting their school community through a proactive approach to social media and tech education that equips students with future-ready skills.
Supporting students spiritually, intellectually, and physically
St. Croix Lutheran Academy is a private, grade 6-12 school in Saint Paul, MN with about 500 students. They pride themselves on equipping all students with a Christian education and are proud to say they have students from 17 different countries. St. Croix’s mission is to educate the total student, spiritually, intellectually, and physically, in a caring, Christian family community.
To support the whole student and fuel academic success, Frey recognized that their school needed to prevent problems stemming from social media before they impacted students’ ability to learn. “Our students are on social media just like any other teen would be from any other part of the country, or at any other school, and they fall into the same pitfalls. We were seeing a growing trend in that not only more students using social media platforms, but more students getting into trouble with these platforms as well.”
After experiencing a rise in disciplinary issues involving social media and tech, Frey and his administrative team looked at different options for addressing these challenges proactively. At first, they brought in one-time speakers but found it difficult to coordinate schedules, and they wanted something that wasn’t just a one-and-done experience.
“We wanted something that had more continuity to it that we could build off of, and we wouldn’t just have a bunch of one-off topics coming in… it didn’t take me too long to realize [#WinAtSocial] is definitely the route that we wanted to go to give us that continuity, and help us do something that could work within our schedule, and could be more proactive with our students.”
By implementing #WinAtSocial, The Social Institute’s peer-to-peer learning platform that grows with students year-over-year, St. Croix finds that they can easily teach lessons that prevent disciplinary challenges, rather than always reacting to issues that arise.
#WinAtSocial: Aligned with Biblical values and unique school schedules
When exploring and implementing #WinAtSocial, it was essential for Frey that The Social Institute’s program aligned with St. Croix’s mission and purpose. “First and foremost, we wanted to make sure that TSI’s program did not compromise our school’s mission, Christian values, and Christian-Lutheran doctrine in any way.”’
After learning about The Social Institute’s Social Standards, like Use Your Mic For Good, and how they are incorporated into each lesson, Frey knew that #WinAtSocial’s program fit their school culture and “did not compromise biblical values in any way.”
“We feel like The Social Institute, after using it for about a year and a half, is a very comfortable fit for us in what we’re trying to do and what we’re teaching our kids.”
While #WinAtSocial fits well with St. Croix’s culture, it’s also easily integrated into their school day. The Social Institute’s turnkey approach can be tailored to fit any unique school culture with a robust set of lessons that are ready to run and flex to fit class schedules. Frey found that #WinAtSocial Lessons are simple to implement into their schedule, and “do not put more on teachers’ plates.”
“The lessons are very much plug and play. You open up a lesson and it gives you a rundown of what the lesson is. You can read through that, or you can run a demo on it, taking yourself through a short class and what that would look like based on the topic or the lesson that you’re choosing, and then you just run it, and it runs itself.”
With teachers at St. Croix often wearing many hats, Frey is grateful that #WinAtSocial is easy to implement and run, and incorporates regularly updated lesson content that is interactive for students.
Finding the perfect fit for turnkey lessons, co-created with students, for students
At St. Croix Lutheran, #WinAtSocial is integrated into their religion class. Educators have the flexibility to run lessons on trending topics that are currently impacting students, or topics that align with the class’s lesson plan that day.
“We give our religion teachers the freedom to say, hey, if there’s something that you’re noticing students are going through, or something that comes up in the world that you think it’s important to talk about, go ahead and grab a lesson from #WinAtSocial,” Frey shared.
#WinAtSocial delivers student-embraced, age-appropriate lessons that highlight student perspectives and voices. These lessons are updated regularly to address current events, and tech & social media trends impacting students.
Frey revealed that one December, right before winter break, he saw that students were very busy and struggling with focus and time management. To address this, he stepped in to facilitate #WinAtSocial in one of their classes:
“I ran a lesson on time management, and how to use time management along with technology, and that was a good discussion on what kids are struggling with right now, as they’re busy during that part of the school year. We discussed what strategies they are using, or that they aren’t using to help them navigate that.”
Since #WinAtSocial Lessons are constantly enhanced to fit students’ ever-changing needs, it’s easy for St. Croix Lutheran to find and run lessons that address subjects that students are facing:
“We like that the curriculum is regularly updated, so not just updated as far as current events, but also different topics that are added to and tweaked as the months go on. We like that the lessons are student-focused and student-centered, and those lessons are very much discussion-focused and interactive, something that’s hard to create on your own.”
Frey now sees that students and educators are learning from each other when running #WinAtSocial Lessons. Students gain essential life skills while educating teachers on new apps, student experiences, and insights into their social worlds. Plus, students at St. Croix are taking the lessons they learn from #WinAtSocial and are applying them to the real world:
“We are seeing more concrete examples of people using social media for good, whether they are promoting Christian values, or they’re promoting school events. Just this morning, I was dealing with an issue where one student jumped online to defend another student, and they were just kind of acquaintances, they weren’t necessarily friends, so that was really cool to see that some of that stuff is happening.”
Curious to learn more about #WinAtSocial Lessons or want to demo a lesson in your classroom? Contact us today and we will work with you to set up a plan for using #WinAtSocial to best address your strategic priorities.
In the meantime, check out some of #WinAtSocial’s most popular Trending Lessons:
- Trending Lesson for grades 9-12:
- Trending Lesson for grades 5-8:
- Trending Lesson for grades 3-4:
The Social Institute (TSI) is the leader in empowering students by understanding students. Through #WinAtSocial, our gamified, peer-to-peer learning platform, we equip students, educators, and families to navigate their social world – in the classroom and beyond, online and offline – in healthy, high-character ways. Our unique, student-respected approach empowers and equips, rather than scares and restricts. We incorporate timely topics about social media, tech use, and current events that are impacting student well-being and learning. #WinAtSocial Lessons teach life skills for the modern day, capture student voice, and provide school leaders with actionable insights. Through these insights, students play an essential role in school efforts to support their own health, happiness, and future success as we enable high-impact teaching, meaningful family conversations, and a healthy school culture.