The pursuit of happiness has been an age-old quest and an elusive one at that. Everyone desires
it, though it means different things to different people. Because of its subjective nature, the agency
for being happy often remains with the individual. So why and when did such a subjective concept
become the object of global and national concern to be fostered in schools?
Evolution of school-based wellbeing programmes

In 1986, in response to rising socio-emotional
problems among young people, the Ottawa Charteri extended the concept of ‘health’ to
include physical, social and mental wellbeing, and urged other sectors to share the responsibility of
promoting it. The ‘Global Mental Health Initiative’ (WHO, 1995) recommended schools take charge
of fostering socio-emotional wellbeing. Since then, several policy documents were released,
directing schools to develop life skills, psycho-social competencies and provide better identification
and early intervention to students with mental health issues. Thus began the global movement for implementing a host of school-based mental health programmes ranging from mental health
and wellbeing to child safety and safeguarding.

Status of wellbeing programmes in schools The Indian education ecosystem has also been
abuzz with discourses around mental health, wellness, and wellbeing. Various programmes for
life skills, socio-emotional learning, adolescent development, value education, yoga, mindfulness,
meditation and happiness have been introduced to promote wellbeing in school. Post-COVID-19,
programmes like Manodarpan and SAHYOG were launched to support children and youth in dealing
with emotional crises. While these efforts are commendable, they have
been sporadic and piecemeal – usually adopting a top-up approach by devoting some time to
conducting activities during or after school. A vast majority of the teaching fraternity perceives these
as ‘additional’ to their primary responsibility of teaching the core curriculum. The general lack of
an understanding of what wellbeing is and why it is important obfuscates the intent and impact that
these programmes could have.

Understanding wellbeing
‘Wellbeing’ is often interchanged with many other terms like wellness, happiness, welfare, or quality
of life. There has been no universally-accepted definition, thus far. A synthesis of commonly-used
definitionsii implies that wellbeing includes:

• Physical health and fitness
• Mental, social and emotional health that comes
  with trusting relationships and belief in a just
  world
• General contentment with life that comes from
  self-belief and achievement of goals
• A sense of purpose in life that makes living
  worthwhile

Wellbeing, therefore, is a multi-dimensional construct encompassing the physical, mental,
socio-emotional, intellectual, as well as the societal aspect of an individual’s being, often seen as being
part of good health. It has both a subjective and an objective dimension as well – while individuals
may differ in their life’s purpose or what makes them happy (the subjective element), a good life
and life experiences as per social norms and values are much the same for everyone (the objective
element).

Importance of wellbeing at school
The growing years spent at school are most critical for developing a worldview and a belief system
that determines the attitudes and behaviour that children will eventually bring to adult life. With
the universalisation of education, schools are uniquely positioned to ‘catch them young’ and
meet children’s physical and socio-emotional needs, predisposing them to experiencing positive
emotions. In a stratified and diverse society like ours, this means that all children irrespective of
their circumstances, can experience wellbeing and have a fair chance at life.