Well-Being First Professional Development

"Well-Being First" is an interdisciplinary professional development model that is designed to promote Head Start teachers' health, resilience, and wellbeing as well as organizational well-being within the early care and education programs.  

Well-Being First is designed to support Head Start teachers’ individual and

organizational well-being through:

• Three days of all-staff training based on the science of well-being.

• Facilitated time for teams to identify the sources of educators’ stress and create

organizational action plans.

• Monthly support from our team to help turn your action plans into reality.

• Four-hour leadership training for Head Start program leaders to encourage them to use

trauma-sensitive approaches with staff

Our goals are to help Head Start educators:

• Establish healthy behaviors that promote personal well-being

• Build positive and supportive relationships

• Reduce stress and burnout

• Engage in effective communication about individual and organizational level stressors

• Identify strategies to manage stressors personally and collectively

• Collaborate to make organizational changes

Acknowledgement: This project is supported by the Johns Hopkins University Catalyst Award and the Administration for Children and Families (ACF) of the United States (U.S.) Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) as part of a financial assistance award (Grant #: 90YR0130). The contents are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily represent the official views of, nor an endorsement, by ACF/HHS, or the U.S. Government. For more information, please visit the ACF website, Administrative and National Policy Requirements.