Aidan Phillips- The Wave Trust Thursday 10 December 2020@ 18.45 for chat 19.00 Meet

Aidan Phillips- 

THE WAVE TRUST

Aidan Phillips from the Wave Trust was the Zoom speaker at Thursday’s meeting of the Club.  The Trust was founded in 1996 by business strategists with the aim of developing and implementing solutions that can effect the healing of adverse childhood experiences.

Members were intrigued to hear about the Trust’s work, which addresses issues of psychological trauma, predominantly in schools, but also reaches into family life. Aidan explained that where schools had been involved in the Trust’s programme there was marked evidence of improvements in behaviour and, more generally, in learning experiences.  At the root of difficulties experienced in school in terms of pupils’ learning and behaviour, there is frequently a pattern in the home background of abuse, neglect, bullying or the separation of parents.  Aidan illustrated the impact such experiences can cause in the way that the brain and the body react, causing fear, a loss of trust, destabilisation of moods and disturbed sleep patterns, particularly where such negative experiences are regularly repeated.

Looking to ways of addressing these complex issues, Aidan spoke of the effectiveness of introducing what he described as trauma-informed principles into schools – or, indeed, other organisations.  Predominantly, healing in relationships is the glue that binds together the other elements of the approach. These include implementing policies of collaboration, control, safety, compassion, respect and trust.  Illustrative of this is an approach to the individual asking not “What is the matter with you?, but “What has happened to you?”  Building on this approach, key messages for implementing a strategy can be summarised by the need to unearth the root of poor behaviour; the prioritizing of good relationships; promoting a sense of individual responsibility; establishing an appropriate discipline for learning; and creating a calm learning environment.  Fundamental to the success of such a strategy is ensuring a supportive staff culture.

Where such approaches have been adopted, there have been spectacular improvements: for example, in one school exclusions of pupils reduced from 43 percent to 5 per cent.  In another case, aggressive events have been significantly reduced, and associated with this has been a reduction of staff absences.  These improvements have been evidenced in both primary and secondary schools.

Aidan emphasized that the Trust is working with educational authorities to promote the adoption of the approaches they advocate on a wider scale.

Thanking Aidan, Nick Rawlings noted the obvious engagement of Club members as evidenced by the extent of questions; the presentation had certainly captured their attention and interest.  He wished Aidan the Trust well in its future work. 

Link to video