‘Calming rooms’ look to improve student behavior at LPS

LAWTON, Okla. (KSWO) - Calming rooms in Lawton Public Schools look to allow students to step away from the classroom for no more than 10 minutes and regroup.

Cassie Jones, who is a mental health professional for Project AWARE, says its purpose is in its title. AWARE stands for Advanced Wellness and Resilience in Education. Upon entering the calming room a student is met with an adult usually it’s a discretionary aid from the school.

“By having a calming room. it’s more of a preventative it is pro-active,” Jones said. “It is teaching kids that there is a safe space that they can go to when they are beginning to feel the signs of stress.”

Jones mentions that one teacher she spoke with said that some of her students returning to the classroom were more focused and less anxious.

“Go to a nice calmly lit room it’s not glaring lights like these and there are things to touch and there are things to play with,” Jones stated. “There are soft places for them to rest their heads until they can get their emotion under control so they can return back to the learning environment.”

She also mentioned that the setup for the calming rooms came at no cost to the schools. All items used including toys, pillows and games were bought through a grant given to LPS through the Oklahoma State Department of Education.

“Our end result is to provide the best resource we can for our students to be mentally and physically healthy and have success academically,” Project AWARE Manager, Danna Bross, said. “We want to provide them with every resource we can possibly give them to be successful.”

So far only Pat Henry Elementary School and a few other schools are involved in this initiative but Jones hopes that they will be able to add other schools in the future.

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