(See the end of the post for important Handbook ordering info!)
September 21, 2009
By now almost everybody is back at school (including those people on the quarter system who like to make everyone else feel jealous in August and early September!) and in the thick of things. I am incredibly pleased to report that we have more than twenty schools using The Project Happiness Handbook so far and that there are even more getting ready to take the plunge. Meanwhile all of us on the Project Happiness team are gearing up and are excited to take the plunge right along with you!
As many of you know, however, our curriculum isn’t quite in yet… (I put that in a smaller font hoping it might get less notice!) Our Assistant Director, Rolando Sandor, has been hard at work for several months polishing the Handbook, from fixing typos to improving the layout to making it easier to reference different sections. The good news is that the Handbook is a lean, mean happiness machine! The bad news is that it will not arrive in our offices until some time later this week.
I have received e-mails from many of you and have talked to others, so I know that this is a bit of a setback. Moreover, it is difficult for me to dive in and help in the way that I want when you are not all up and running with a physical textbook. But, following the curriculum’s advice, I have decided to paddle downstream and try to go with the flow.
So as the school year gets started, here are some things I can do for you:
• Look at your objectives/goals for a class and make detailed suggestions about Project Happiness activities that might be the right fit.
• Help you brainstorm extension activities that work for your program.
• Provide you with excerpts from the first chapter to get you started.
• Connect you with other like-minded facilitators for collaboration.
• Help you develop a fundraiser to raise money for the curriculum.
• Point you to resources on social and emotional learning, mindfulness and active listening.
• Even engage in geekiness around writing, language and Project Happiness as a fellow linguistics enthusiast!
And to facilitate my role facilitating the facilitators (!) I am establishing regular virtual office hours. From 1:00PT/4:00ET to 2:30PT/5:30ET on Mondays and Wednesdays, I will be available to talk. And, to make sure everyone gets to communicate with their favorite distance tool, there are three ways to connect with me:
• Via phone at (650) 833-3882 (I can call you back in the continental U.S. and Canada)
• Via Skype with the user name abbykonopasky
• Or via Google chat with the user name abby@projecthappiness
You can e-mail me ahead of time to let me know you’d like to talk or you can just go ahead and contact me. Also, if those times are inconvenient, just contact me and we can set up an appointment that works for both of us. I can’t wait to hear how things are going and how I can support your vision for Project Happiness.
Abby Konopasky
(650) 833-3882
abby@projecthappiness.com
