We have a discipline problem in our public schools. A 2016 U.S. Department of Education report found 2.8 million K-12 students received one or more out-of-school suspensions.
On the surface, this seems to be improving, given this is a 20 percent decrease from the 2014 report. However, this decrease is only because many schools are beginning to use alternative forms of punishment, realizing that traditional discipline is not working, and there is no evidence to support it ever has.
One such school trailblazing a path in alternative discipline is Robert W. Coleman Elementary School in Baltimore. The Baltimore school still uses detention, but students are not writing papers or staring at walls — they are practicing mindful meditation and yoga. So far, this alternative discipline has yielded amazing results — zero suspensions in the 2016 school year.
Coleman Elementary has partnered with the Holistic Life Foundation, a Baltimore-based non-profit, for a project called the Holistic Me after-school program.
The program hosted at Coleman Elementary serves around 120 students who participate in various activities, including breathing exercises, meditation, yoga and fitness.
Holistic Me boasts an impressive average daily attendance of 85 percent and also claims that many students return when they are older and volunteer to teach classes and arrange trips to community clean-ups and greening projects.
Along with the after-school program, Coleman Elementary has replaced its timeouts with the Mindful Moment Room, commonly referred to as the “calm down room.”
Disruptive or upset students are sent, along with a counselor, to the room where they participate in breathing exercises, meditation and dialogue with the counselor about the incident and how to manage their emotions. Students are also allowed to send themselves to the room with a counselor whenever they want.
Trips to the Mindful Moment Room, which usually last 20 minutes, have become teachers’ first resort for disruptive students, and most students show visible success in relaxation and de-escalation.
However, many still doubt the benefits of using meditation in schools.
While written accounts of meditation appear in Hindu texts from 1500 BCE, scientific research on the benefits of meditation has only recently been conducted.
A 2011 study by Harvard researchers found that practicing mindful meditation has physical effects on the brain. According to their research, after 8 weeks practicing meditation, Gray Matter in the brain increased, along with mass, and four regions of the brain thickened, including areas responsible for cognition, emotional regulation, empathy, compassion and stress.
While research on meditation has only been around for just over a decade, there are many studies showing meditation has a variety of benefits for students including improvement in test scores and GPA, reduction in ADHD and other learning disorders, increased intelligence and creativity and up to a 40 percent reduction in psychological distress.
Coleman Elementary is not the only school buying into the positive effects of meditation.
Patterson High School, a nearby Baltimore school, partnered with the Holistic Life Foundation and boasts lower suspension rates and increased attendance rates because of the Mindful Moment program.
On the other side of the country, California-based Mindful Schools, a nonprofit organization founded in 2007, has taught educators in all 50 states and more than 100 countries how to introduce meditation to their students.
While these programs are too new to confidently claim long-term standardized success, it’s time we stopped looking at meditation as an activity for hippies and start considering the potential benefits of meditation as an alternative disciplinary method.
Jay is a 22-year-old finance senior from St. Simons Island, Georgia.

Gallery • 2 Photos

courtesy of Holistic Life Foundation

Holistic Life Foundation meditation