If you would like to use Be Good People, please (A) complete the registration form on behalf of your school, (B) read the FAQs below, and (C) complete training, using videos located at the top of each grade-band page.

A welcome from creator Nic van Oss 👋, who shares why he started this project in 2020.

Browse a worldwide map 📍 of the thousands of schools that are using Be Good People.

Hear from teachers 📣 who are using Be Good People in their classrooms.

Easy and Effective

Our #1 priority was to make Be Good People as teacher-friendly as possible. Since its launch, we've made many sweeping enhancements based on teacher feedback. Teachers describe it as "self-driving" and "sub-proof."

Following best practices for locally-developed curriculum, Be Good People incorporates CASEL's SAFE elements. Its instructional features are common among evidence-based curriculums, and it is closely aligned with state SEL standards. At this time, we consider Be Good People to fall in ESSA's Tier 4 ("Demonstrates a Rationale").

Three Ingredients, Limitless Recipes

Be Good People doesn't lock you into a rigid sequence. We offer example schedules with meaningful progressions of activities, but we encourage you to customize them to find the right "recipe" for your school.

✋ Frequently Asked Questions

How can I receive updates?

We strongly recommend that users of Be Good People subscribe to our mailing list. We send a handful of emails each school year notifying our mailing list of significant updates to the curriculum.

How can I offer feedback?

We encourage you to use our feedback form (also linked in the footer of this website). We appreciate suggestions and input!

Specifics are very helpful to us (e.g., "In the staying on task lesson for 4-5, maybe you could add this photo to step 2: http://www..."

Are training resources, pacing guides, etc. available?

At the top of every grade band page, you'll find an "Implementation Resources" heading. Click the button to open a webpage with training videos, example pacing guides, coaching forms, and more.

If you work outside of our member districts and feel you need additional support, you can contact our MTSS & School Climate Specialist, Nic van Oss (nvanoss@scred.k12.mn.us), the lead developer of the curriculum. Outside of his work for the St. Croix River Education District, Nic is able to contract with external districts as a consultant/trainer.

Can I contribute somehow?

Yes! We're very passionate about crowdsourcing and public educators supporting each other.

We strongly encourage staff in external districts who are benefiting from Be Good People to support the project by contributing Extension Activities. These are YouTube videos with discussion questions, read alouds, worksheets, etc. — just a collection of resources that teachers can use to enrich learning around the Be Good People lessons. If you share a resource with us, we will credit you as the creator (if you'd like).

Here is an Extension Activity slide template that you can copy if needed, and here is a dropbox where you can share resources with us.

Feel free to reach out to our MTSS & School Climate Specialist, Nic van Oss (nvanoss@scred.k12.mn.us), if you have any questions.

Is there a cost to use the curriculum?

No, it is not monetized and not designed to make monetization possible (e.g., it includes many embedded YouTube videos and free-use elements).

We are not a for-profit publishing company — we are a small rural public district. We allow other districts to use Be Good People with purely altruistic intentions. If you like our work, we encourage you to learn more about our district, follow us on social media, etc.

If your school/district plans to implement Be Good People, we ask for three things:

In addition, please consider using or modifying our example pacing guides, monitoring fidelity with our observation/self-assessment forms, etc.

If I'm having trouble playing a video, what can I do?

There are two types of videos embedded into Be Good People presentations: (1) YouTube videos and (2) videos stored in Google Drive.

YouTube videos

Videos stored in Google Drive

On a SMART Board, you may see an error message that reads: "Unable to play video. Error: 5." SMART is aware of this issue, and it is because of the low capabilities of the browser built into the Board. SMART's solution is to connect your laptop to the Board using an HDMI and USB cable. You will then have touch control of your laptop from the display.

Can I make a copy of or print one of the presentations?

The presentations are deliberately set to be non-copyable, and we do not permit any copies to be made.

There are numerous digital SEL curriculums available from publishing companies (e.g., CharacterStrong, Second Step, Rethink Ed). If a district pays a subscription fee, they obtain access to an online module of non-modifiable lessons. From the outset, the goal of this project was to mimic the experience of having access to one of those curriculums. We simply wanted to take that model and make it cost-free in order to support our member school districts. Aside from cost, in every other respect our intention is to recreate the experience of subscribing to a published digital curriculum.

If there are changes or improvements you would like, we strongly encourage you to submit feedback using the Google Form linked at the bottom of this website page. Development of the curriculum is ongoing and very active. We've spent thousands of hours making improvements to Be Good People, all of which were driven by teacher feedback and collaboration. It would be impossible to meaningfully improve many fragmented versions of the curriculum, which is a major reason why we do not permit the curriculum to be split off.

The restrictions that make the presentations non-copyable also make them non-printable. In any case, the presentations in Be Good People were not designed to be printed.

Can I use a digital response tool (e.g., Nearpod)?

No, because just like similar digital curriculums that are not designed for local modification (e.g., CharacterStrong, Second Step, Rethink Ed), the only way to add a digital response feature would be to build that feature into a custom software platform, and as a small rural school district that doesn't have its own custom software platform for Be Good People, that's impossible.

To support nonverbal response options, we encourage instructors to explore no-tech options. These options include, but are not limited to:

For secondary students, more information is available in the Be Good People training materials.

How can I add a lesson to Google Classroom?

This question comes up because when you click the "Add"/paperclip button in Google Classroom, Google Classroom wants to be able to make a copy of the file you're sharing with students. Because Be Good People lessons are non-copyable (see FAQ above), that's not a workable method for sharing the lessons with students in Google Classroom.

Instead, we recommend that you:

Are translated materials available?

Not at this time, and as a district we do not have a timetable for if or when translated versions of Be Good People might be created.

From a quality control perspective, we would only embark on a translation project if several parameters were met, which include:

Because Be Good People is a non-monetized curriculum created by staff at a small school district and because it makes heavy use of embedded YouTube and short-form video content that is only available in English, the infrastructure necessary for a translation project within the parameters outlined above would likely only be available through a significant partnership with a non-profit organization and fundamental changes to the curriculum itself (e.g., the video media content used throughout).

If your district has a need for translated materials (e.g., to support a dual language immersion program), we encourage you to investigate resources that are better positioned to meet your needs, such as a variety of published curriculums that are available in multiple languages.

Is there research available on the curriculum?

Be Good People is a locally developed curriculum created by educators at a small rural district. It is not published by an enterprise curriculum company, and it is not designed to make monetization possible (e.g., it includes many embedded YouTube videos and free-use elements).

As a district, we are open to partnerships with researchers and universities that would provide the infrastructure for research studies on Be Good People.

At this time, we consider Be Good People to fall in ESSA's Tier 4 ("Demonstrates a Rationale"). It is built on a well-defined theory of action. As a district, we monitor effectiveness through our district- and building-level data routines; however, we cannot isolate Be Good People as a factor or observe its effects relative to control groups.

We designed Be Good People with these limitations in mind, and our primary plan to support efficacy was to build the curriculum around CASEL's recommendations for locally-developed curriculums: the S.A.F.E. elements.