As academic pressure continues to mount at Dougherty Valley, the yoga elective has become a space where students can step away from overwhelming stress and engage in meaningful physical activity. Designed to promote comprehensive well-being, the class offers students a rare pause in an otherwise demanding school day.
The program was originally started by DVHS teacher Ramona Altman, the current dance teacher. As student interest grew and additional sections were added, Ann Booras was hired to take the lead in expanding and shaping the course. Yoga is now available as an elective to students after they have completed one year of ninth-grade P.E., and counts toward the required one year of P.E. between grades 10 and 12.
“Yoga personifies the whole principle behind physical education, which is a healthy mind, body and soul,” Booras said. “We want whole-person well-being, not just your physical body, and yoga is all of that.”
Beyond the requirements of a typical physical education class, yoga creates space for conversations students rarely have elsewhere.
“I love the freedom to dive into these more important issues with kids that they don’t cover in other classes, specifically the stress that we have here at school and the pressures that we have, which causes a lot of unhappiness within our student body,” Booras explained. “I really enjoy being able to give kids a break from all of that, and a place to feel safe, relaxed, and themselves.”
This sentiment is echoed by students, who say hearing about the class’s structure attracted them to it. DVHS senior Shreshta Janagama said she chose yoga intentionally to balance out the more demanding classes in her schedule.
“I decided to take yoga because I knew senior year would be stressful with college apps, and thought yoga would be the perfect way to wind down during the day,” Janagama said.
Research supports the positive effects students and teachers describe at DVHS. A 2015 study published in the International Journal of Yoga found that school-based yoga programs significantly reduced students’ stress, anxiety and emotional reactivity, while improving mood, self-regulation and psychological well-being. And, according to a 2021 EdSource report, a growing number of California schools have added yoga to the school day in response to rising student stress, observing that it improved student focus, behavior and emotional resilience.
However, the program wasn’t always this way. Booras explained that in the early years, yoga was structured much like other academic classes.
“When we were first teaching it, we taught it the Dougherty way, with projects and assignments and presentations,” she said. “But as the years went by and I recognized more of the effects of our Dougherty culture on students, we started to change that. The last thing that kids need is more homework assignments, more written assignments or more presentations.”
Instead, the focus shifted towards stress management, relaxation and learning emotional regulation.
“I saw the need to focus more on the relaxation and de-stress and the managing of emotions that you learn through yoga, and that’s kind of where we’ve evolved to,” Booras stated.
Students are appreciative of that shift, and have felt its impact.
“Yoga is different from my other courses in that we get to decide how much we can push ourselves, and when we need to take breaks,” Janagama said. “It’s very stress-relieving because of the amount of meditation and stretching we do every class.”
Looking ahead, Booras hopes to expand the program even further, potentially including a class dedicated entirely to meditation.
“The kids are so tired, and I find myself walking into class each day to notice that everybody is just drained,” Booras reasoned. “I’d like to keep evolving with student needs, and it seems that adding a class or two that is one-hundred percent meditation every day would help.”
These meditation days are already popular among students.
“My favorite activity by far are the meditation days every Friday, as they allow me to catch up on sleep and are very relaxing,” Janagama said.
Booras believes the benefits of yoga include building essential life skills as well as self-awareness. As students roll up their mats and head back into the academic rush of the day, Booras hopes they carry more than just flexibility with them.
“We’re never very present in life, right? Especially here, we’re always thinking about the next class or the next assignment. But yoga teaches students how to recognize what they’re feeling in the moment, physically, emotionally, mentally or spiritually, and what they can do to navigate them through breath and movement,” she said.
