The University of Montana (UM) and the University of Montana Foundation have announced a $9.4 million gift from the Missoula-based Dennis and Phyllis Washington Foundation in support of efforts to address challenges in K-12 education and behavioral health in the state.

The gift will bolster a two-pronged initiative at the UM Phyllis J. Washington College of Education to improve youth behavioral health in Montana while incentivizing graduates to stay in the state. Through the new Institute for Positive Education, the college will integrate positive psychology—which emphasizes the development of strengths-based well-being rather than suppressing negative behavior—as the guiding focus of its curriculum. In addition, the gift will support the Phyllis J. Washington Scholars Program, which will assist academically excellent students who are committed to teaching in Montana schools for three years after graduation.

Longstanding supporters of the university, the foundation provided a gift in 2009 that led to the college being renamed after Phyllis Washington. The foundation also funded the construction of a new wing of the Phyllis J. Washington Education Center, which was unveiled in 2019.

“The Institute for Positive Education will infuse the principles of positive psychology into educational environments throughout Montana and beyond,” said UM Department of Counseling professor John Sommers-Flanagan. “If we focus on growing and nurturing strengths, skills, and virtues within teachers and students, then anxiety, depression, and trauma will shrink in their significance because students will have internal ways of managing their distress.”

(Photo credit: Getty Images/Daniel De La Hoz)