Wellbeing Club is Worth-it’s quality assured training course and library of training and resources for Senior Mental health Leads in schools and colleges. Joining Wellbeing Club provides you exclusive access to CPD and resources within our Wellbeing Academy.

This guide covers what to expect when you first join Wellbeing Club including the requirements to ensure DfE funded SMHL’s meet the terms of their grant funding.

What is a Wellbeing Club?

Wellbeing club is an annual subscription programme.The programme allows you to access practical courses and resources inside our Wellbeing Academy as well as exclusive learning and community areas only for Wellbeing Club members. 

All the Wellbeing Club content is all based on positive education and organisational psychology approaches.The courses, activities and resources are all designed to support members that join to develop a sustainable and embedded approach to school positive mental health and wellbeing.

Joining Wellbeing Club helps Mental Health and Wellbeing Leads learn HOW to develop a whole-school approach to school wellbeing and  helps you feel confident to actually put your plans for developing mental health and wellbeing in your school into action. 

Once you have joined you will be able to access an annual subscription to a growing library of online courses, practical CPD workshops and downloadable mental health resources and wellbeing activities for pupils and staff.

Who is the Wellbeing Club for?

Wellbeing Club is aimed at individual staff members (usually in a leadership role) who are able to influence strategic work around supporting mental health and wellbeing for the whole school community.  

As there is a broad range of CPD and resources available as part of your membership, these can be used to share with staff and colleagues to increase capacity for whole school mental health and wellbeing.

Who can access the Wellbeing Club Programme

The programme licence provided one year access for one named member of staff per school. If more than one person is required to access the programme beyond the named individual, additional member access can be provided at a discounted rate per additional member.

If you need to change the person who has access during that year, you are able to swap who is the member accessing the programme. To do this, get in touch with us via email, with the name and email of the person you would like to be the new member for your school and we can swap them over for you. If you are funded by the DfE and change the SMHL in your school you will also need to let the DfE know you have swapped over your mental health lead.

Wellbeing Club Membership Details 

Wellbeing Club is an annual subscription. You have access for one year from the time your log-in details are sent to you via email. The log-in details are sent on receipt of payment. You will not be able to access the programme until we have received payment either by card or invoice payment.  

Your membership year starts from the day the log-in is sent, not the day you first log-in, as this can be days or even weeks later. To get the most out of the Wellbeing Club we recommend, if you can, to get started as soon as you receive your login access.

Using the DfE Funding to pay to join Wellbeing Club

As a DfE SMHL Training fund assured provider many eligible schools claim the DfE training grant for SMHLs to pay for their first year of access to the Wellbeing Club. The funding only covers one person/membership. 

The DfE grant is £1200 while ours costs start at £795+VAT. This means your school or college gets to keep the remaining funding to spend on further training, support or resources to help the mental health lead develop mental health and wellbeing in their school or college. 

If you have some surplus permissible spend left you may want to put this towards a second membership for someone in your team to help you put in place your plans for school mental health and wellbeing.

If you have already used your DfE funding with another course provider you could put the remaining funding (permissible spend) towards Wellbeing Club or some of our other courses such as our Wellbeing Toolkit course.

Not using the DfE funding to cover the costs of the Wellbeing Club

The Wellbeing Club programme is not exclusively developed for DfE funded members and is valuable for schools who are not eligible to access the funding. These include schools from Scotland, Wales or Northern Ireland, independent and international schools also access Wellbeing Club. These schools usually self fund through CPD or pupil premium budgets.

Non DfE funded members get the same access to all the Wellbeing Club courses, resources and community as funded members.

How to get started in Wellbeing Club

Once payment has been made you will receive online access details. Your membership starts from this date and is due for renewal 12 months after this date. 

You will be sent your login details via email from our Wellbeing Academy email address. You may want to check junk or spam just to make sure your login hasn't ended up in the wrong inbox. Please mark this email address as safe so you don’t miss any updates of communications about Wellbeing Club.

The first time you log in you will watch a short welcome video which introduces you to the programme and advises you the best place to start. 

We will also require you to complete a new member survey. The survey helps us get to know you a bit more about you and your aims for mental health and wellbeing in your school. Once this is completed all the areas you have access to as part of your membership will unlock.

Access will depend on what membership tier you have ordered - starting, developing or embedding. If anything is locked that means it is not part of your Wellbeing Club member access.  If anything is 'coming soon', this is something new you will be able to access in future. 

We will send you regular updates via email to let you know about new courses and content that is added to your membership. Please look out for our emails so you don't miss anything.

What happens in the first few weeks of being a Wellbeing Club member

As part of your programme Wellbeing Club membership orientation we will send you a series of emails to help you settle over the first few weeks. This will highlight the different features of your membership so you don't feel overwhelmed that you have to access everything all in one go.

Developing and Embedding tier members will be invited to an optional short 1-2-1 welcome call with one of our team. This will help you settle in and start to plan your journey through Wellbeing Club. The aim of everything we do is to help you meet your aims and plans for school mental health and wellbeing.

If you are brand new in post SMHL and are DfE funded we recommend you start with a short introduction to the role of SMHL course to help you get started.

DfE SMHL Training funding requirements

If you are using DfE funding to pay for your 1st year’s access there are some course requirements that ensure you meet the terms of the grant funding. 

Not completing the minimum requirements could result in you having to return the grant funding, so it is important you understand your role in ensuring these funds are used as intended. 

Fortunately, the requirements are not too onerous and as long as you are working towards reviewing and action planning school mental health and wellbeing and you are completing the DfE monitoring processes, you are meeting the terms of the funding.

However, we want to encourage you to get the most out of your membership you can because that is what will make the biggest difference to the mental health of children and young people in your school.

Is there a SMHL Qualification I Get as part of Wellbeing Club?

All DfE Assured providers, like us, have to adhere to specific learning principles and outcomes for SMHL's to meet the quality standard set by the DfE. If you do any courses that are designed you meet these learning outcomes you can say you are 'qualified' or 'certified' as a Senior Mental Health Lead.

We have designed our SMHL Wellbeing Pathway course with all the essential information required to lead your whole school approach. If you complete the SMHL Wellbeing Pathway Course in Wellbeing Club you can see this as a 'SMHL qualification'.

We see this 'qualification' a bit like passing your driving test. When you pass you are 'allowed' to drive, but you actually start learning to drive once you've had your test and been driving for a while. Because of this Wellbeing Club is much more than getting a quick rubber stamp 'qualification'. Wellbeing Club is about supporting you over time learn HOW and WHAT to do to develop your school or colleges mental health and wellbeing with access to ongoing support through that journey, through resources and community for 12 months or longer.

CPD and Training Certificates

Wellbeing Club is a professional development membership. We know everyone loves a nice training certificate, and that sense of achievement. Once you have completed the learning outcomes you will be able to download a course completion certificate for each in-depth course or mini course. The certificate button only appears once the ticks for each objective have been completed.

The amount of courses you can access will depend on the membership tier you have joined as a member at (starting, developing or embedding). Each of these have a certificate, providing you meet all the learning objectives.

Action plan to develop school mental health and wellbeing

To meet the terms of the DfE training grant you need to ensure that you are working towards the 8 areas covered by the learning outcomes for Senior Mental Health leads taken from public health England’s 8 principles for a whole school approach, the SMHL learning outcomes can be found here.

According to the DfE ‘

'one of the most critical requirements is that all seniors' mental health leads are supported to evaluate their current whole school or college approach and to create a plan for the implementation of a whole school or college approach in their setting’. 

Wellbeing Club access provides review and audit tools and training on how to use these, through its online SMHL Wellbeing Pathway course and workshop sessions. These live practical sessions provide an opportunity for members to plan and develop their school mental health action plan.  

Through accessing progress logs and drop-in hotline calls members can gain individual feedback and guidance on their whole school or college implementation plan from our trainer. We encourage you to attend these live workshops if you can to gain invaluable peer support, the ability to share effective practice and gain feedback.

DfE requirements for implementing a mental health action plan

The minimum requirements a DfE-funded member must achieve in a year they have access are

  1. To review and reflect on the school or college's current approach to mental health and wellbeing
  2. To develop an action plan to improve access to mental health services for children and young people to reduce mental health problems
  3. To create and start implementing an action plan to work towards whole school mental health and wellbeing
  4. Did you start your training before the specific funding window (March 23 or March 24) and where possible to have completed the bulk of your training by the end of the corresponding academic year (July 23 or July 24)

This however is a suggested bare minimum and we find Wellbeing Club Members can make significant progress to develop a wellbeing strategy in a year, with plans to go beyond their first year of membership.

The more time you have and the more you access the CPD and resources the more you get out of the programme. You can also progress through membership tiers to access more courses and resources at each level you access.

Working through the Wellbeing Club Programme

Once your access is unlocked by completing the new member survey you will see you have access to quite a lot of information and CPD. 

You see you can access several areas of our Wellbeing Academy as part of your membership. You will also be able to access the exclusive Wellbeing Club areas just for members these are

  • Wellbeing Club Community- For latest updates, ongoing help, live session booking and tracking your progress
  • Consultancy and Coaching - For ongoing help, encourement, feedback and shortcuts join our monthly drop in consultancy calls or complet your termly action plan
  • CPD Library- Professional development workshops just for Wellbeing Club members on specific areas of developing mental health and wellbeing.
  • Staff Wellbeing Workshop Library- CPD to support staff wellbeing in your role of mental health lead (developing and embedding teir only)
  • School examples- Examples of effective practice and resources from other schools and colleges
  • Resource Hub- Practical downloadable school mental health and wellbeing resources for developing your whole school approach to mental health and wellbeing.

These areas are added to every half term, meaning the CPD and resources in the membership build during the time you are a member.

Wellbeing Club Sneak Peak

Courses and Resources Wellbeing Club Members can access

  1. The SMHL Pathway Course - exclusive course for Wellbeing Club members on reviewing, planning and leading whole school approach to mental health and wellbeing (essential for DfE funded members)
  2. Wellbeing Toolkit Course - our leading positive education course which teaches you have to use a whole range of evidence based mental activities (developing and embedding tier)
  3. Staff Development Toolkit Course - our train-the-trainer CPD programme to help you increase staff capacity to support mental health earlier and share strategies for wellbeing (developing and embedding tier)
  4. Staff Wellbeing Toolkit - our psychology based toolkit of staff wellbeing tools, resources and strategies and training in how to use them to develop staff mental health and wellbeing as part of your whole school approach (embedding teir)
  5. Each course has a set of downloadable practical wellbeing activities and resources

There is much more information about all the courses and resources inside the Welling Club on our content library page. 

Ongoing learning and development

Once you have your school wellbeing action plan you can engage in any of the Wellbeing Club content based on what you have identified as a priority. There is no expectation that you complete ALL the CPD available in Wellbeing Club, we see it like a buffet where you try a bit of everything then ‘eat’ the bits you like the most.

Wellbeing Club Membership Levels

Based on member progress and feedback, Wellbeing Club now offers three different learning pathways through the content depending on which stage a member is at in their journey to whole school mental health.

These are ...

Starting - beginner new in post SMHL getting their whole school approach suited, reviewed and started.

Developing- a SMHL that has made progress to develop school mental health and is looking for training and resources to implement their action plan and develop school mental health and wellbeing

Embedding - a SMHL who has made significant progress developing school mental health and is now looking for training and resources to embed consistent school-wide strategies.

Beginner Senior Mental Health Lead learning journey - 'Starting Member'

Each course or workshop is mapped to our dynamic framework for developing mental health and wellbeing, you can start anywhere on this journey.  But if you are not sure where to start or what to do first? We recommend that new or beginner SMHL’s start with the following course in this order

  1. Introduction to the Role of SMHL Mini Course
  2. SMHL Wellbeing Pathway Course
  3. Mini-courses, Toolkits and CPD workshops depending on action plans and priorities

Intermediate Mental Health Lead learning journey - 'Developing Member'

You have already started to develop school mental health and wellbeing and are looking for practical tools and resources to share with colleagues. Or you are looking for strategies to prevent the onset of mental health problems with pupils, we then recommend these courses for intermediate Senior Mental Health Leads

  1. SMHL Wellbeing Pathway Course
  2. Wellbeing Toolkit Course
  3. Understanding Monitoring and Evaluation Mini Course
  4. Staff Development Toolkit Course
  5. Understanding Barriers to Staff Wellbeing Workshop
  6. Mini-courses, resources and CPD workshops depending on action plans and priorities

Advanced Mental Health Lead learning journey- 'Embedding Member'

You are well on your way to developing whole school mental health and wellbeing and are looking for practical tools and resources to embed a consistent approach for your whole school community including working with parents, families and stakeholders.

  1. SMHL Wellbeing Pathway Course
  2. Wellbeing Toolkit Course
  3. Understanding Monitoring and Evaluation Mini Course
  4. Staff Development Toolkit Course
  5. Parent Toolkit Course (coming soon)
  6. Staff Wellbeing Toolkit
  7. Introduction to Coaching Young People
  8. Supporting Staff Wellbeing Workshops
  9. Mini-courses, resources and CPD workshops depending on action plans and priorities

Learner Satisfaction Surveys

Feedback and evaluation is essential to ensure you are getting the best out of Wellbeing Club please complete evaluation surveys and reviews that are sent via email.

One of the funding requirements for DfE funded members is to complete  learner satisfaction surveys and is an important indicator of whether senior leads attending training are getting what they need, in terms of knowledge and skills to implement and sustain a whole school or college approach. 

This includes whether the coaching and other resources you are providing were effective, and give learners the tools needed to achieve their objectives.

You will be asked to complete an evaluation to review how well you feel the wellbeing club membership have met the DfE quality principles for senior mental health training courses based on the the learning outcomes.

You may also be contacted directly by the DfE to provide learner feedback.  It's important if requested you provide this feedback to meet the funding requirements.

What happens at the end of the year access?

We have developed Wellbeing Club to be a consultancy and CPD membership that grows and evolves with you and your school needs. Once you start developing whole school mental health and wellbeing you will realise it is going to take much longer than a year. We often say it can take a whole cohort to go through your school from start to finish to fully embed whole school wellbeing, in other words up to six years!

Toward the end of your year's access, we will get in touch with a renewal notification email to let you know your membership will be automatically renewed. There is no obligation to remain a member, but we would love it if you did so we can support you through your journey as it evolves and changes over time.

If you don't want to renew your membership, just let us know and we end your membership and you will no longer be able to access the programme.

You will then be invoiced for another year, at the same rate you joined with even if the prices have increased for newer members. We will also check your progress and suggest you move to the next membership teir to help you continue to grow and develop in the role of SMHL.

Not already joined Wellbeing Club? You can find out more about the programme and how to join here.

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