The inaugural group of girls in the new Ruling Our Experiences (ROX) program at Westerville North High School has been exploring topics to help them navigate their own relationships, experiences and decisions.
This week’s lesson focused on self-defense, from trusting your gut when something doesn’t feel right to learning moves to help them feel empowered to defend themselves in any situation.
“Always check yourself and go back to feeling that feeling where I’m in a parking garage and I’m walking alone and someone is behind me,” Nikki Dunbar, a mental health specialist and ROX facilitator at WNHS, said to the girls. “That feeling means something is wrong.”
Since September, the students — all freshmen — have delved into discussions about friendships, communicating effectively, managing stress, online dating and relationships and dating abuse. The topics follow ROX’s evidence-based curriculum, which features 20 lessons for girls in grades 5-12 and is aligned with the American School Counselor Association’s Students Standards for Mindsets and Behaviors.
“It’s all about empowering girls and equipping them with the skills to empower themselves,” said Erica Beebe, a school counselor and ROX facilitator at WNHS.
WNHS is the latest Westerville school to add the ROX program. Westerville Central High School started a group this school year after launching its first ROX sessions for students in spring 2019. Mark Twain Elementary debuted the program last year. School counselor Alisha Porter, who has been a ROX facilitator since 2016, hosted ROX groups at Whittier Elementary for two years before bringing it to Robert Frost Elementary where it has been in place for three years.
“I wanted to bring ROX to my school because I've noticed that many girls do not have a strong relationship with other girls and lack self-confidence during this stage in their lives,” Porter said. “ROX allows for them to build both of these things while learning more about themselves and creating habits to help empower growth as a female.”
To date, she has worked with 66 girls in five different groups — including one that featured Robert Frost students attending Westerville Virtual Academy last year.
“It has allowed the girls to really feel proud of themselves, to embrace the beauty of being a girl (inside and out), finding a group of girls that they can rely on and laugh with as well as taking charge of their decisions,” she said.
Mark Twain school counselor Serena Casale observed Porter’s group and after some research, talked to school psychologist Dr. Natasha Stoll-Juredine about implementing the program together.
“We knew there was a need for social-emotional groups at Mark Twain and wanted to get some things together to support our students,” Stoll-Juredine said.
They launched the program last school year as a way to provide additional mental health support for students during the pandemic and the cohort A/B schedules. They organized two groups — one for each cohort — and alternated meeting with students in-person and virtually. When schools returned to all in-person last spring, Casale and Stoll-Juredine brought the two groups together to interact.
Though the program is still early in its implementation, ROX has made an impact on how students connect with each other — even after they’ve moved on from elementary school. Stoll-Juredine and Casale heard from one student who said that she has applied the lessons she’s learned in middle school to help improve her relationships with others.
“This program has also helped to bring together girls that may not interact with each other much so that they can learn more about each other and potentially gain new friendships and relationships,” she said.
The ROX curriculum spans elementary and secondary levels, focusing on team building, healthy communication, dealing with girl drama/bullying, healthy relationships, navigating social media, body image, support systems, sexual harassment, safety and violence prevention, stress and coping, academic and career development and leadership.
At WCHS, school social worker Hannah Zoller and school counselor Mackenzie Kloepfer recently talked to the freshmen and sophomore girls in the program about boundaries, the 4 types of communication (passive, passive-aggressive, aggressive and assertive) and the dynamics of social media. They meet with their group twice a week.
“We are hoping the girls gain confidence in themselves, feel validated for some of the unique experiences they are faced with just by being a girl and continue to learn how to lift up other girls to create a community of support,” Zoller said.
Efforts to expand the ROX program in Westerville are underway. Counselors at various schools are applying for a grant to expand the program in their buildings and increase the number of students who can participate. And school counselors Marcia Childs and Amy Weinrich — both of whom are trained ROX facilitators — plan to resume the program at Blendon Middle School after hosting a group prior to the pandemic.
WNHS freshman Abigail McLaughlin feels fortunate to be able to participate in ROX and the lessons she’s learned so far have helped her navigate through her first year of high school and the relationships she’s made as well as how she engages in social media.
“It’s really showing me how to grow as a person,” she said. “It’s taking the things I’ve learned and using them to improve upon the social aspect of things that we do. I’ve been able to apply it to the real world and that’s been something that’s really helped me because I can see things much clearer now.”