Christine Ahern

Ahern’s innovative teaching idea, “Coping for Life,” focuses on creating a directly usable and sustainable curriculum around stress management, in collaboration with the Uxbridge High School health department. Recent surveys of the school’s students show that they are overwhelmed from anxiety, depression, and stress. With support from the Voya grant, students will be provided a variety of tools, equipment, and hands-on activities to enable targeted mindfulness and stress management practices which take place in the classroom. Ahern envisions extending the Voya grant even further by having her students create their own stress management toolkit, share resources on their school website and collaborate on the school’s bi-annual health and wellness fair so all students can hone their coping skills.