(NewsNation) — For a kid, traditional therapy may seem intimidating and unapproachable at first, leaving parents and school workers looking for new ways to introduce them to talking with a professional.
A few years ago, administrators at the Oliver Hazard Perry School in Boston had an additional problem. They didn’t have enough resources to provide at-risk kids with the support they needed.
“Especially at that time, we didn’t have a full-time social worker. I think we had a one-day-a-week psychologist at the school,” said Mike Macchi, the former principal at the Perry School.
During the 2018-2019 school year, while Macchi was there, the school started “Chalk Talk,” a program offered by local nonprofit Doc Wayne, providing weekly sessions between the students and coaches who double as clinicians, imparting lessons while walking the kids through various sports activities.
Unlike psychotherapists talking to students one-on-one, Chalk Talk uses a team sports setting to help youth build tolerance for distress and regulate their emotions.
Liv Emerich, a licensed social worker who served as one of the Chalk Talk coaches, used basketball to impart her lessons, starting the day with a slogan.
“One of my favorite ones is, ‘Got your back.’ And so, if our slogan for the day is got your back, then that’s what we’re going to be talking about the entire time. What does it mean to have somebody else’s back? What does it mean to have your own back? And how can we see that in real time?” Emerich said.
Macchi saw a real change in his school’s students after these sessions. In one case, a student had lost his father and was struggling with controlling his anger and his emotions; he had even been suspended multiple times.
While participating in Chalk Talk, the student formed a relationship with one of the coaches and eventually learn to better regulate his emotions.
“He developed those strong leadership skills where he was not having those challenges in class anymore,” Macchi said. He’s since moved to another district, but the Perry School continues to work with Chalk Talk today.
Chalk Talk students facing adversity such as homelessness, neglect or abuse showed signs of improved behavior nearly three-quarters of the time, according to a 2021 study of the program.
Of the students who took part, 72% were less aggressive, had improved self-esteem and were less likely to harm themselves.
One reason for its success is that kids may find this style of connection more approachable than traditional psychotherapy.
“Everything I’m doing now is thinking about how to provide mental health services to kids in a way that they feel like they can access it without being pointed out as somebody who has a problem. It’s very stigmatizing … being able to do this at school in a sports situation, that’s genius,” said Michelle Porche, a psychiatry professor at the University of California San Francisco who helped study the program.
Still, those involved in running the program noted that it may not be for all children.
“It is movement-based. So for some youth who really struggle to be in their bodies, this may not be the therapeutic method for them,” Emerich said.
Porche noted that this form of therapy may be particularly appealing to boys because of its nature. More than 80% of the participants in the study were boys.
The service isn’t free, but schools incur no costs except paying a partnership fee to Doc Wayne. The group bills the students’ health insurance, which is often Medicaid.
To Rebekah Roulier, who serves as deputy director of Doc Wayne, sports-based therapy is effective ultimately because it gives kids something to take part in.
“You can actually practice the skills that you’re working on rather than talking about something that happened last week or thinking about what might happen tomorrow, like you would in a traditional therapy session,” she said