The average American 12-year-old spends between 4.5 and 6.7 hours each day in front of a screen. Countless studies debate whether this is a symptom or the cause of a deepening crisis: loneliness and isolation. Either way, the statistics are harrowing: since 2010, the number of tweens and teens reporting “feelings of exclusion” has increased by over 35%; suicide rates for middle school girls are up by an astounding 70%; fully half of sixth grade students report they have been the target of bullying in the past 30 days alone! What we see in the classroom each day confirms just how starved young people are for a sense of belonging, heartfelt human contact, and community. These are among the greatest gifts SPIRIT SERIES has to offer…

Eighteen years. Three states. Twelve percent average annual growth. As we approach another major milestone, we’re definitely getting ready to celebrate: 50,000 students served! It’s hard to believe that what started as one parent’s response to his daughter’s grief after losing her mother has grown to touch so many lives. Of course, numbers aside, the real milestones come every day in countless triumphs, small and large: Naomi, the blind sixth grader who would not let disability stop her; or Ricardo, the fifth-grade boy who had been in and out of homeless shelters and wrote at the end of SPIRIT SERIES: “I have more confidence than I knew. Now I feel like I can do anything!”

The numbers are now in for Year Two of our assessment and, we are proud to report, that partner teachers as well as participating students have told us much the same story as in Year One: SPIRIT SERIES works! For the second year in a row, we can report positive program impact in every one of the SERIES’ nine goals.

The school year is now in full swing, but for 33 educators in Southern California and Maine, school was in session this summer…and they were the students. These were the pilot participants in SPIRITWORKS, a transformative approach to professional development introduced this August at two Summer Institutes. Built around the SPIRITWORKS Leadership model, distilled from thousands of hours of classroom instruction, this method begins from a basic principle: transformative outcomes with students must begin with transformation in ourselves.

With two highly memorable pilot residencies now completed in San Francisco, our first year in Northern California has been an unqualified success. And our footprint is already growing in the region. SPIRIT SERIES plans to serve 500 students in six partner schools from San Francisco to San Jose during the 2018-19 school year and is about to hire a gifted Northern California Program Manager: Rajiv Shah.

After 18 years, SPIRIT SERIES is now on the threshold of making its primary mission a reality: to advance a new transformational paradigm in K-12 education. This summer we will launch a major initiative — the SPIRITWORKS Teacher Certification Program — a robust 60-hour professional development curriculum built around the SPIRITWORKS training model, currently in use by SERIES staff and