Eric could be described as a typical high school junior. He has a good number of friends, is on the cross country and track teams, plays a mean guitar, and has a GPA hovering between 3.5 and 4.0. (Okay, maybe he's not so "typical.") Trouble is, Eric attends one of the highest-scoring high schools in the country. Not a bad problem to have, you may think, but the peer pressure to get into an elite college is pretty intense.
"We keep telling Eric that there are a lot of excellent schools to choose from for someone with his grades and test scores," says Eric's mom, Diane. "But he really has to work hard to keep his grades up."
There are certainly worse dilemmas facing today's high school students, but Eric and his family are dealing with a very common issue: stress. For some kids, stress comes from social or relationship issues. Some just don't like how they look. For others, the pressure comes from the struggle to get good grades. And for many students, simply being a teenager is stressful enough.
"I'd say I'm a happy guy," says Eric. "School's okay, and I have fun with my friends. I just get stressed out sometimes."
Stress is part of everyone's life, but many high school students are trying to cope with new pressures they've never dealt with before. Everyone wants to be happy, but stress – and other issues – sometimes gets in the way of happiness.
The Challenge of Staying Happy To many of his peers, Eric appears to be one of the happiest kids in school. But his parents were concerned that Eric's frustration with his increasingly challenging curriculum seemed to be getting worse.
"He'd never really had trouble in school before, so we were a bit surprised by Eric's change in attitude," says Diane.
Fortunately for Eric and his parents, Eric's high school was one of the first to offer Thrive Research's
InJoy program. Developed in partnership with Stanford University's Behavioral Sciences Department,
InJoy is designed to help students recognize and build on their strengths, as well as improve the ways they cope with stress and emotions. In short, the idea is to help teenagers "learn" how to live a happier life.
"Eric's pretty easy-going most of the time," says his dad, Kurt. "But if he's having trouble in a certain class, or has a big track meet coming up, he gets pretty down in the dumps. So we were intrigued when he told us about this program his Health class was running."
That program,
InJoy, challenges students like Eric to make small changes and incorporate new techniques into their daily life.
Some of the goals for students taking the
InJoy program include:
-Improve your confidence and your day-to-day experiences
-Learn skills to reduce negative thoughts and feelings while increasing positive thoughts and feelings
-Use your personal strengths to increase positive experiences
-Improve your relationships with others
"This is a very effective way of instilling common sense into students' daily lives," says Kurt.
A Student and His Parents Enjoy InJoy InJoy provides techniques for happiness enhancement and highlights ways to find meaning and pleasure in everyday activities. Students are introduced to concepts such as time perspective and the relationship wheel to encourage self-assessment and reflection – and to use their personal strengths to increase positive experiences.
"A lot of this stuff I already knew," says Eric. "It just made me think about it more."
InJoy features comprehensive assessments and interactive activities, so students take to the programs quickly and enthusiastically while tracking their progress as they make their way through the sessions.
Parents, too, can follow their students' progress (though parents can't see students' answers, comments, or discussions with peers). Eric chose to share some of his sessions with his parents, so they could get a better sense of how the program worked.
"I can see why Eric enjoyed it so much," says Diane. "It's very interactive, and presents pretty complex information in a very easy-to-understand way."
Eric, particularly, liked the fact that the system kept track of his responses and let him know how he was doing. Assessments at the end of each session measure and promote well-being. Students can set goals and track them online. Logs occur periodically throughout
InJoy, and students may review their previous logs in order to view their behavior change as they progress through the program. "The time goes by really fast," says Eric. "They should do more classes like this."
The program focuses on developing skills and exercises: Happiness, Signature Strengths, Coping Strategies, Habits and Rituals, and Relationships.
InJoy can also be used as a preventative measure against depression.
In a Stanford University School of Medicine clinical study of high-risk high school students who completed
InJoy, nearly half showed a decrease in their risk of depression.
Fortunately, Eric showed no indication of depression – much to his relief, and that of his parents – but did pick up some valuable strategies for coping with stress and dealing with relationships.
As Diane puts it, "Clearly, this is a well-researched, well-designed program. It covers some very important topics that students need to be aware of."
A Rewarding Experience Interactive discussions add to the effectiveness of the
InJoy program. Students can share thoughts, feelings, ideas, and suggestions with one another privately, culling peers' strategies for dealing with the same issues they themselves are facing.
"It's amazing to see how many other guys are feeling exactly the same way I am," says Eric.
Eric, Diane, and Kurt also liked Thrive's Rewards Contract, where students can set a goal with their parents and earn Thrive Points for doing well-being activities. We all like feedback and rewards, so Thrive awards individual Thrive Points. Parents can work with students to determine a reward, based on the number of Thrive Points earned. (Eric's aiming for an iPad.)
For Eric and his parents,
InJoy offered a little help in areas generally not found in most high schools' curriculum. With dropout rates on the rise, and schools facing budget crunches, a program like
InJoy can supply that missing ingredient in a student's quest for success.
Perhaps Eric's dad, Kurt put it best:
"I would have liked something like this when I was in high school."
To learn more about
InJoy and other Thrive Research offerings that give students a boost in their quest for success, please visit
Thrive Research.
