A decade ago, Dr Tom Brunzell was new to Victoria, pushing a big idea.
He had emigrated from New York because he was inspired by work the Australian charity, Berry Street, had been doing in developing an evidence base charting the neurobiological impacts of childhood stress and childhood trauma on children’s growth and school Engagement.
This tied in strongly with Tom’s own ideas about how childhood stress and adverse experiences affect a young person’s educational pathways, and so he was looking to create the Berry Street Education Model (BSEM), developing training and strategies for teachers to better support children impacted by trauma and community Stressors.
“The Newsboys Foundation gave me my very first grant for our work at Berry Street,” Tom recalled.
“Sandy Shaw (Newsboys CEO) and her board took a big leap and said, well, this educator from New York must have some promising ideas, and we’re going to see where those ideas go and what we were trying to do. The Berry Street Education Model has just celebrated its tenth anniversary, and I attribute the success to Berry Street and also to our significant community partners like Newsboys.”
It’s been a big decade. From that fledgling idea, the BSEM has now expanded from two Victorian pilot schools to all states and territories. This growth in Berry Street’s reach meets the increasing needs of schools to provide far more than learning how to read. Teachers must attend to wellbeing needs, cultural needs, and relational needs in the classroom each day.
The model has reached more than 80,000 teachers, across all states and territories of Australia, as well as spreading to New Zealand, the United Kingdom, Ireland and Hong Kong. So far. “And Newsboys has been there, every step of the way,” he said.
“The model is certainly about trauma-informed education, but it is actually strength-based education,” Tom said.
“We are there for the educational engagement of children and young people. We see ourselves as a teaching and learning pedagogy where, if teachers use our strategies, embed our work and reconceptualise the rhythms of the school day within the rhythms of community, that’s when we see the levers of change happen within instruction and instructional practice.
“We know that 72 per cent of our Australian children have experienced at least one adverse childhood experience in their families, and almost 30 per cent are reporting high psychological distress. Almost one quarter of them are reporting loneliness all or most of the time.
“Our strategies are not just for students impacted by trauma; youth mental health statistics are not going in the direction that we hope for right now, so the BSEM is a proactive response. This is for teachers to build a culture of community, a culture of psychological safety and a culture of learning.”
Newsboys Foundation CEO Sandy Shaw said: “Philanthropy is at its best when it helps seed a big idea, and for Newsboys the satisfaction of seeing the BSEM evolve, be embraced so widely and have such a positive impact on young lives makes the years of support worthwhile.”
Berry Street’s Tom Brunzell said: “The BSEM is now a fully self-sustaining business within a large non-profit organisation, but we still very much need philanthropy for our innovation and transformation initiatives. We could never had done what we’ve already accomplished by ourselves. We benefited from the guidance and encouragement of Newsboys every step of that last ten years.”
“Thanks to Newsboys, for example, we have been able to establish our 80,000-strong alumni network, and create an alumni portal website to capture great ideas, dialogue and resources for those teachers. When we started, I thought we would work with a school for a time, set
them up and then move on to the next school, but in fact, schools often want to continue to do our masterclasses, they want to connect to others who have done the work and receive updates from us.
“We discovered we needed to build this capacity to support schools far beyond when they have done our initial foundational training course, and that’s where Newsboys was there for us again.”
Even as the BSEM spreads globally, Tom and his team continue to explore what is possible in educational system improvements. They are in the planning stages for a major research project, slated for 2025, to understand and address the continuing, complex unmet needs of students. It will be one of the largest randomised controlled trial designs in Australian schools to explore how BSEM can be a proactive intervention for all students.
“We have a proactive, strength-based response. The study we plan is to specifically track mainstream schools and universal populations of students, to track those outcomes and show over time that this BSEM work is not just for students impacted by trauma, or just for students in out-of-home care, but can be a promising response for all students to support their learning and growth.”
In August 2024, it was reported in the media that nearly 30 per cent of Victorian students are struggling with literacy and numeracy, according to the latest NAPLAN exam results. Experts called for system-wide reform.
“Everyone is wringing their hands around equity funding and curriculum, and it’s at these moments that I’m so proud that Berry Street is on the front foot to say we have a response to increase student achievement—and wellbeing as a dual purpose within schools,” Tom said.
Nick Place, 2024