Aleesha Darr runs Harvesting Balance holiday classes

A teacher says a ‘tick-the-box’ approach to wellness in schools led her to create her own after-school program to help young girls navigate mental health in the modern world.

A Bundaberg teacher says a disheartening gap in wellness services provided at schools led her to offer her own classes.

Aleesha Darr began her journey into wellness when she noticed cliques in her classes struggling to get along and the impact this had on their learning.

“I worked so hard, we did so many wellbeing activities on top of the regular curriculum to get them to like each other,” she said.

The positive impact of these activities led Miss Darr to create Harvesting Balance, an after-hours and holiday program aimed at encouraging wellness in school-aged girls.

“As teachers you just don’t have time to do it in class, there’s such a big gap in the system” she said.

Miss Darr said teaching often had a tick-the-box approach to wellness support and students were not encouraged to apply wellness approaches to their everyday life.

“In schools it’s like a box you tick, ‘I asked kids how they were today’ wellbeing session done,” she said.

Miss Darr found students would often approach her with personal issues such as trouble at home, substance abuse and family financial struggles.

“Girls would come to me with problems that they don’t feel comfortable bringing to a guidance officer,” she said.

The nature of student-teacher relationships meant Miss Darr could not offer one-on-one support with her students, but had to report anything confessed to her to the guidance counsellor.

“As a teacher you’re not allowed to give advice, you have to go straight to the guidance counsellor” she said.

This had created a culture with little accountability for student mental health.

“Schools are getting more funding for wellbeing these days, but wellness is such an ongoing thing, kids need to see it woven into all aspects of their life,” she said.

The lack of accessibility to guidance counsellors on campus created further difficulties.

“Kids don’t feel comfortable, or they don’t feel like their issues are big enough to go to counsellors so there’s this huge gap especially in kids who have confidence and anxiety issues,” she said.

The lack of counsellors in schools also has an impact on availability to students, with wait times to get a student in front of counsellors being up to a week.

“The kids don’t have that relationship to open up to counsellors, and that’s where you as a teacher have to bring it up, people get lost” she said.

She’s tried her best to create lasting wellness methods for kids in her after-school programs, but admits there are limitations.

“The reality is not everyone can afford to come after school, not everyone’s parents own a car to get them here after school, not everyone’s parents even care about wellbeing,” she said, adding this was why it was so important for schools to thread wellness education throughout education so students had the tools to build lifelong wellness.