AGIS Conference 2026 Potsdam: Full Schedule

Working Together To Support Learning

9:00am CEST

Student Support Full-Day Conference: aligning student support practices through different frameworks, requirements towards student-centred approaches and biopsychosocial model

Friday September 18, 2026 9:00am - 3:45pm CEST

Lake View Room

This full-day workshop introduces the biopsychosocial model (Engel, 1977) as a unifying framework to align counsellors, learning support teachers, school psychologist, nurses, progress leaders, and leadership across. Participants will explore how biological (health, neurodevelopment), psychological (cognition, emotion, identity), and social (culture, family systems, peer context) factors intersect to influence learner agency, wellbeing, and academic access.
The workshop explicitly addresses how to plan within the school and support all stakeholders, integrate documentation requirements, access and inclusion arrangements, safeguarding expectations, and external accreditation standards of each country/region into one coherent process, through cross-divisional case analysis and systems mapping, participants will design aligned referral pathways, case meeting protocols, and documentation templates that meet multiple frameworks while maintaining a learner-centred approach and keep the standards regulated from both the educational and local frameworks.

The structure of the full-day session should be based on the following timeline:
08:30-9:00 Welcome Coffee
9:00-12:45 Morning Session
Holistic education
The biopsychosocial model (Engel, 1977) and ICD 11
Ecological systems theory (Bronfenbrenner) and developmental neuroscience
Mapping IB constructs (Learner Profile, ATL, agency, inclusion) onto biopsychosocial domains
From “support service” to “whole-school ecosystem”
12:45-13:45 Lunch
13:00-15:45 Afternoon Session
Sharing of resources and co-planning
Case studies

References
Engel, G. (1977). The biopsychosocial model. Science.
Bronfenbrenner, U. (Ecological systems theory).
Immordino-Yang, M. (Affective neuroscience and learning).
IB publications: Learning Diversity and Inclusion in IB Programmes, Access and Inclusion Policy, Approaches to Learning, and safeguarding guidance.

Speakers