How Vanessa Thomas and her team are building the Antioch community through House Points.
Building Community. That’s what sets apart the best schools. Schools that celebrate each other and hold each other accountable have undeniably strong cultures. But unlike the physical building that houses the school…community isn’t permanent.
If you don’t cultivate community, your staff and students will inevitably pull apart. This is why many school leaders find themselves grasping and holding onto examples of positive culture in their buildings.
The team at Antioch Middle School hasn’t been holding on to their school culture, they’ve been building it. This year alone they have recognized students 1.5 million times for displaying positive behavior.
500K of those positive events can be attributed to students listening and being on task during their classes.
All that positivity has kept the student reward store busy to the tune of 3K reward transactions.
So in an era fraught with hurdles to creating a positive learning environment, Antioch is thriving.
What’s their secret?
Well, it all starts when students enroll at AMS and officially get selected into their House System as a Grizzly, Panda, Glacier, or Polar Bear...but before we talk about the how, let's take a deeper look into the who.
Building Community. That’s what sets apart the best schools. Schools that celebrate each other and hold each other accountable have undeniably strong cultures. But unlike the physical building that houses the school…community isn’t permanent.
If you don’t cultivate community, your staff and students will inevitably pull apart. This is why many school leaders find themselves grasping and holding onto examples of positive culture in their buildings.
The team at Antioch Middle School hasn’t been holding on to their school culture, they’ve been building it. This year alone they have recognized students 1.5 million times for displaying positive behavior.
500K of those positive events can be attributed to students listening and being on task during their classes.
All that positivity has kept the student reward store busy to the tune of 3K reward transactions.
So in an era fraught with hurdles to creating a positive learning environment, Antioch is thriving.
What’s their secret?
Well, it all starts when students enroll at AMS and officially get selected into their House System as a Grizzly, Panda, Glacier, or Polar Bear...but before we talk about the how, let's take a deeper look into the who.
“I encourage incentives at every level! Before students get to us as administrators I want to make sure we have done everything we can do to keep our students engaged and motivated to do the right things.”-Vanessa Thomas, Dean of Culture
The commitment to community and culture really sets Antioch apart from other schools. Through AMS’s Community Achieves program, they partner with local businesses and organizations to support school initiatives and provide wraparound services for their students and families.
The work is really a community effort and Vanessa Thomas is leading the charge from the building as AMS’s Dean of Culture. Vanessa oversees student discipline, the House System, and the student-run rewards program.
As the Discipline leader at AMS Vanessa knows the importance of positive reinforcement. When schools rely solely on traditional punitive measures to manage behavior, exclusionary discipline instances rise and so does the referral management load on administrators and other staff.
To support the system Vanessa creates professional development opportunities for her staff around classroom management, social-emotional learning, and behavior data analysis.
By focusing on those areas, she builds both buy-in and competency within her staff. But all that work would be for naught without student buy-in.
To do that Vanessa and her team would need to lean into building school pride, teaching responsibility, and instilling mutual respect among their students.
Students and staff are sorted into Houses. Houses are like teams within your school that you can customize to fit your school culture. You choose crests, colors, flags, handshakes, names, and sometimes even dances!
Students remain in the House until the end of 8th grade. They are mixed by grade level and evenly distributed. Every student is now part of a team.
Students learn what House they will belong in at their annual “House Induction” event.
Older students come to watch and celebrate as new members are inducted into their houses.
The student’s advisor moves up a grade level each year with the students.
The Antioch House System is dedicated to
Houses are comprised of smaller groups of students called House Families. Each House Family is led by one or two school staff members who serve as “Mama” or “Papa Bears”. House Families meet together daily for all three years of each student’s middle school experience to:
Students earn House Points for meeting or exceeding school-wide expectations. House Points are then awarded to a student’s account in LiveSchool.
Antioch is a Community Achieves school, which means they partner with businesses, volunteers, non-profits, and colleges to provide wrap-around support for all their students and families.
AMS serves students in grades 6-8 and every student and staff is a member of one of four bear-themed Houses.
The rubric Antioch developed is designed to improve individual student behavior as well as create a sense of belonging to the community. Every point earned individually is also a point earned for your House.
The rubric categories allow the staff at AMS to focus on the core competencies they feel are most important:
This category works in multiple ways. The first is the daily requirement for students to be “good to go” for class. AMS also attaches monthly SEL goals to this category.
For instance, if the goal for the month was “relationship skills” then to earn this point students would need to be prepared for class and also return a welcome greeting to their teacher as they enter the classroom.
This is a great way to mesh PBIS and SEL initiatives into one actionable system that teachers can use to teach and reinforce necessary skills. In addition to daily academic-based “binder-checks” Vanessa and her staff chose to focus on 5 key competencies for their students:
The staff felt like focusing on respectful speech and actions was important to allow their community to thrive. This includes student-student and student-staff interactions.
The team identifies and emphasizes positive interactions that they want to see more of and this category allows them to reinforce and reward students for exhibiting them.
This might be as simple as rewarding students for using “please” and “thank you” when you are passing out classroom supplies.
This category is dedicated to academic success and growth as it pertains to students submitting classwork in a timely manner. Submitting work on time is important because it demonstrates an understanding of the value of deadlines and a commitment to completing tasks.
Additionally, submitting classwork on time allows the teacher to provide timely feedback and helps the student stay on track with their coursework.
Incentivizing work ethic in middle school is a great way to develop life-long habits that will serve the students of Antioch well for years to come.
AMS staff are looking for students to participate, help their peers, and complete classroom jobs. Ideally, these habits will foster a growth mindset and a positive attitude that can help students persevere through difficult tasks.
Listening is a skill that should be emphasized at all levels but nobody knows the importance of listening and following directions quite like middle school teachers.
Listening skills help students focus, remember information, and express their thoughts and ideas in a meaningful way. This isn’t something that comes naturally to most students in this age range.
Good listening skills can also help students build strong relationships and learn to respect other people’s opinions which helps reinforce the other skills emphasized at AMS.
The results that are tied to the rubric are outstanding; 1.5 million points have been awarded to the students at Antioch this year for meeting the criteria listed above.
Students and parents can see points in real-time by logging into LiveSchool on any device.
Students may spend their LiveSchool Points to purchase:
Antioch’s School Store is uniquely positioned to be both motivating to students and sustainable for staff.
The store is managed completely by students and supervised by staff. Students apply for positions in the store and must maintain a standard of behavior in the building to be eligible for and keep their position.
Students who earn positions at Paw-Mart are then paid in LiveSchool points for their efforts!
The store is open 3 days a week and it supports Antioch’s House System in all of the following ways:
The school store has been quite busy; over 3,000 student rewards have been processed through Paw-Mart so far this year.
House Points are also used to help students’ Houses win weekly, monthly, quarterly, and yearly House competitions.
House competitions can be a great opportunity for students to build community with their Housemates and continue cultivating House engagement and pride.
House Competition Ideas: 9 House Celebrations Guaranteed to Motivate Your Students
These competitions are based on total points earned—not on student House Point balances—so students who spend their individual House Points will not negatively impact their House’s point status overall.
All of the structures that Vanessa and her team have built into their House System allow students to be part of the process and create an environment of trust and collaboration.
It also gives the students a sense of ownership and responsibility for the learning environment at Antioch. When students are involved in building their own culture in the classroom, they are more likely to respect and abide by the expectations set forth by their teachers.
Dr. Vanessa L. Thomas is a dedicated educator proudly serving as the Dean of Culture at Antioch Middle School in the Metro Nashville Public School District in Nashville, TN. She previously served as a Literacy Teacher Development Specialist (LTDS) for Metro Nashville Public Schools. She focuses on delivering high-quality interactive professional development sessions to various educators with varied levels of experience.
She specializes in balanced literacy instruction, classroom management, social-emotional learning, assessment, and data analysis. She assists teachers in creating dynamic lessons that engage students in self-discovery and problem-solving. She has provided training across businesses and non-profits such as the Boys & Girls Clubs of Tennessee Valley, the North American Basketball League, and Persuaders, Inc.-Memphis, TN.
In addition to providing high-level professional development, she also has experience with curriculum writing and subject integration. She has co-constructed engaging lessons across disciplines for Metro Nashville Public Schools, Boys & Girls Clubs of Middle TN, Read to be Ready, and Persuader's, Inc.
Vanessa is a dynamic force in the non-profit sector. She has served the Boys & Girls Clubs of Middle Tennessee in various capacities for over a decade. She is a past collegiate president for the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People-University of Tennessee, Knoxville; a proud member of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, Incorporated-Nashville Metropolitan Alumnae Chapter. She also serves on the Board of Directors for the Rediscovering Me Counseling Center and the North American Basketball League.
Vanessa attended the University of Tennessee, Knoxville where she received her Bachelor of Science Degree in Sport Management and Political Science. She is a graduate of Tennessee State University, where she received her Masters in Elementary Education. She received her Specialist Degree in Education and Doctorate in Instructional Leadership from Trevecca Nazarene University respectively.
She lives with her family in the heart of the Music City, where she enjoys volunteering, going to the movies, strolling in the park, and exploring everything our beloved city has to offer.
Building Community. That’s what sets apart the best schools. Schools that celebrate each other and hold each other accountable have undeniably strong cultures. But unlike the physical building that houses the school…community isn’t permanent.
If you don’t cultivate community, your staff and students will inevitably pull apart. This is why many school leaders find themselves grasping and holding onto examples of positive culture in their buildings.
The team at Antioch Middle School hasn’t been holding on to their school culture, they’ve been building it. This year alone they have recognized students 1.5 million times for displaying positive behavior.
500K of those positive events can be attributed to students listening and being on task during their classes.
All that positivity has kept the student reward store busy to the tune of 3K reward transactions.
So in an era fraught with hurdles to creating a positive learning environment, Antioch is thriving.
What’s their secret?
Well, it all starts when students enroll at AMS and officially get selected into their House System as a Grizzly, Panda, Glacier, or Polar Bear...but before we talk about the how, let's take a deeper look into the who.
Building Community. That’s what sets apart the best schools. Schools that celebrate each other and hold each other accountable have undeniably strong cultures. But unlike the physical building that houses the school…community isn’t permanent.
If you don’t cultivate community, your staff and students will inevitably pull apart. This is why many school leaders find themselves grasping and holding onto examples of positive culture in their buildings.
The team at Antioch Middle School hasn’t been holding on to their school culture, they’ve been building it. This year alone they have recognized students 1.5 million times for displaying positive behavior.
500K of those positive events can be attributed to students listening and being on task during their classes.
All that positivity has kept the student reward store busy to the tune of 3K reward transactions.
So in an era fraught with hurdles to creating a positive learning environment, Antioch is thriving.
What’s their secret?
Well, it all starts when students enroll at AMS and officially get selected into their House System as a Grizzly, Panda, Glacier, or Polar Bear...but before we talk about the how, let's take a deeper look into the who.
Building Community. That’s what sets apart the best schools. Schools that celebrate each other and hold each other accountable have undeniably strong cultures. But unlike the physical building that houses the school…community isn’t permanent.
If you don’t cultivate community, your staff and students will inevitably pull apart. This is why many school leaders find themselves grasping and holding onto examples of positive culture in their buildings.
The team at Antioch Middle School hasn’t been holding on to their school culture, they’ve been building it. This year alone they have recognized students 1.5 million times for displaying positive behavior.
500K of those positive events can be attributed to students listening and being on task during their classes.
All that positivity has kept the student reward store busy to the tune of 3K reward transactions.
So in an era fraught with hurdles to creating a positive learning environment, Antioch is thriving.
What’s their secret?
Well, it all starts when students enroll at AMS and officially get selected into their House System as a Grizzly, Panda, Glacier, or Polar Bear...but before we talk about the how, let's take a deeper look into the who.
Building Community. That’s what sets apart the best schools. Schools that celebrate each other and hold each other accountable have undeniably strong cultures. But unlike the physical building that houses the school…community isn’t permanent.
If you don’t cultivate community, your staff and students will inevitably pull apart. This is why many school leaders find themselves grasping and holding onto examples of positive culture in their buildings.
The team at Antioch Middle School hasn’t been holding on to their school culture, they’ve been building it. This year alone they have recognized students 1.5 million times for displaying positive behavior.
500K of those positive events can be attributed to students listening and being on task during their classes.
All that positivity has kept the student reward store busy to the tune of 3K reward transactions.
So in an era fraught with hurdles to creating a positive learning environment, Antioch is thriving.
What’s their secret?
Well, it all starts when students enroll at AMS and officially get selected into their House System as a Grizzly, Panda, Glacier, or Polar Bear...but before we talk about the how, let's take a deeper look into the who.
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