Creating a positive, kind, and healthy campus community is our goal at Hellgate Elementary. Hellgate Elementary is utilizing three research-based programs within our district in order to achieve a safe and positive school environment: OLWEUS, Second Step, and PAX. As a district, we refer to these three as “Connect.”

OLWEUS:  Hellgate Elementary is committed to the Olweus Bullying Prevention Program. The goals of the program are to reduce existing bullying problems among students, to prevent the development of new bullying problems, and to achieve better peer relations at school. 

                    Olweus Rules

• We will not bully others.
• We will help students who are bullied
• We will include students who are left out.
• When we know someone is being bullied, we will tell an adult at school and an adult at home.

 Second Step: A classroom-based social skills program for students in preschool through junior high (ages 4–14 years), with a distinct curriculum for each grade. It is designed to reduce impulsive, high-risk, and aggressive behaviors and increase children's social competence and other protective factors.

PAX: Trauma-informed, classroom-based intervention with a primary goal of teaching students self-regulation. PAX has been proven to change student brain chemistry with life-long effects that dramatically impact mental health, substance abuse, graduation rates and suicide in our children and communities. (PAX is being utilized in building 2 for the 2022-2023 school year and will be rolled out to building 1 for the 2023-2024 school year).

Using the three programs mentioned above, teachers lead weekly class “Connect” meetings to create a healthy space for discussion, reflection, and teach-to’s surrounding bullying and other important topics throughout the school year.