DUNMORE — Situated in the middle of a busy and hectic hallway at Dunmore Elementary Center is a classroom designed to bring calm to those who step inside.
School officials opened the Calm Down Classroom at the start of the school year. The classroom, bathed in blue lighting with a padded ceiling and hard rubber floor, includes various sensory items, puzzles, games, a sensory swing, books and a bubble tube.
Students can come to the room during the school day with an adult, grab an activity item and take time to calm down, talk to the adult about their feelings and return to their classroom. All students, faculty and staff are allowed to use the classroom.
“It allows kids to come in and just recharge,” school counselor Jillian Paulus said.
School staff worked on repurposing the 30-by-20-foot special education classroom last school year and received a $1,500 grant from the Gino LaRusso Foundation, an Olyphant-based nonprofit that aims to boost the mental health needs of students of all ages, supplemented by the school’s own funds. The foundation is named in honor of founder Katrina Kurilla’s late brother, who died by suicide in 2018.
Assistant Principal Michelle Kokindo is excited the school received the grant and to see the new classroom being used. She said it gives students another space to relax that is comfortable.
The entrance to the Calm Down classroom at Dunmore Elementary Center Friday, Nov. 7, 2025. (Christine Lee/Staff Photo)
The Calm Down classroom at Dunmore Elementary Center pictured Friday, Nov. 7, 2025. (Christine Lee/Staff Photo)
A portion of the Calm Down classroom at Dunmore Elementary Center pictured Friday, Nov. 7, 2025. (Christine Lee/Staff Photo)
Some of the sensory activities inside the Calm Down classroom at Dunmore Elementary Center Friday, Nov. 7, 2025. (Christine Lee/Staff Photo)
Discussing the Calm Down classroom at Dunmore Elementary Center Friday, Nov. 7, 2025, are from left, Assistant Principal Michelle Kokindo, Gino LaRusso Foundation Founder Katrina Kurilla, Principal Matt Quinn and school counselor Jillian Paulus. (Christine Lee/Staff Photo)
Dunmore Elementary Center school counselor Jillian Paulus sits in the sensory swing inside the Calm Down classroom at the school Friday, Nov. 7, 2025. (Christine Lee/Staff Photo)
Dunmore Elementary Center school counselor Jillian Paulus shows an activity ball in the Calm Down classroom Friday, Nov. 7, 2025. (Christine Lee/Staff Photo)
Dunmore Elementary Center school counselor Jillian Paulus shows some of the sensory activities inside the Calm Down classroom Friday, Nov. 7, 2025. (Christine Lee/Staff Photo)
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The entrance to the Calm Down classroom at Dunmore Elementary Center Friday, Nov. 7, 2025. (Christine Lee/Staff Photo)
“It’s centralized, it’s quiet, it’s safe, it’s accessible to all and it’s truly the right size for all students to come in and feel cozy, but also have the space that they need to let out their emotions and their feelings or their anger, whatever they’re feeling,” she said.
Kurilla said the classroom gives students the space to express their emotions in a healthy way. Kokindo said the room is used by students, faculty and staff every day and students even ask to use it.
“There’s always someone in there,” Principal Matthew Quinn said.
He said the classroom helps the school’s administrators because it allows students to advocate for themselves and calm down before their behavior escalates.
“It frees our time up a little bit more because we aren’t getting to that level of a behavior that needs our interjection,” Quinn said.
While the Gino LaRusso Foundation has funded Calm Down Corners in classrooms at Mid Valley Elementary Center, Kurilla said the Calm Down Classroom is the first of its kind in a school in Lackawanna County. She said officials in the Scranton and Valley View school districts have reached out to put Calm Down Classrooms in their districts.
Paulus said the room puts the social and emotional learning that students are taught into practice.
“We want kids to know that this isn’t just something they’re learning in school,” she said. “It’s actually put into practice and they can take advantage of that when they need to.”