The Journey Towards Neuroscience-Aligned Education

Please join us for “The Journey Towards Neuroscience-Aligned Education” with Katie Pagnotta, Ellen Surprenant, and Sam Chadwick.

Katie Pagnotta is a licensed clinical mental health counselor, functional success educational consultant, parent coach, and author. She is also the creator of the Brain- and Body-Aligned Responsive Systems (BBARS) of Excellence framework. She guides educators, administrators, and school staff in strengths-based approaches that leverage the human design and empower the development of the necessary mindsets and habits that lead to re-envisioned success; success the achieves goals by rooting in wellness.

Katie authored Empowered by the Human Design: Utilizing the BBARS of Excellence Framework to Foster Student and Educator Success, a book that includes interview segments from 18 experts within the fields of education, psychology, and neuroscience. The book is a work of collective wisdom grounded in Polyvagal Theory and synthesized in a user-friendly way to facilitate practical application for educators. Its reviewers have called it “a powerful and practical new model for regulation and resilience,” “required reading for all educators,” “a gift to the field,” and “a game-changer.” Throughout the book, Katie combines the wisdom of her interviewees with her own research as well as her years of experience as a former K-12 NH public school counselor.

Katie utilizes her book and framework as tools to support schools in their journey of moving towards neuroscience-aligned education. She is passionate about providing professional development opportunities that support the whole school community in order to help educators and students thrive!

Sam Chadwick has been working as an educator for five years, four of which have been at Somerset Elementary School. Even before graduating and starting her professional career she always had a passion for working with kids and did so as a tutor, nanny, and in the PreK/daycare setting. After working with, and learning about students with exceptionalities and students with trauma, she decided to get her masters degree in Trauma-Informed education to better her practice and approach to support all students. Sam runs her classroom with one main mantra for herself, the other adults in the room, and her students; "Be a good human." Sam believes it's important to remember everyone in the classroom has different needs to be successful and assists students in meeting their needs in ways that aren't hurting someone else's path to learning. She works to create a welcoming and encouraging environment where all adults and students can be successful using routine, setting and achieving goals, and using regulation as a path for connection.

In her 30 years as an educator, Ellen Surprenant has been privileged to learn alongside students, educators, and families, in a variety of public elementary school settings. She has worked as a PK teacher, a classroom teacher, literacy specialist, a special education teacher, and an Assistant Director of Special Services. Currently, Ellen is the building administrator at Somerset Elementary School in Hartland, Maine. Her mission is to use a neuroscience and strengths-based approach to grow and support a team that views behavior through a regulation lens; understanding actions as a response to the body's internal state, particularly the nervous system, rather than as intentional or willful choices. The ultimate aim of this approach is to foster a community of safety, creativity, curiosity, and kindness leading to improved job satisfaction and retention for educators and joyful, engaged learning for students.

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