Coraggio Consulting
Loudoun County School Board, Student Services Committee Meeting, Thursday, December 19, 2024

Date: Thursday, December 19, 2024
Place: Loudoun County Public Schools / School Board meeting (see BoardDocs / LCPS-TV)
Length: 58m (video)
Official meeting video (Vimeo / LCPS-TV): https://player.vimeo.com/video/1040974416?rel=0
BoardDocs (School Board): https://go.boarddocs.com/vsba/loudoun/Board.nsf/Public

Machine transcript (speech-to-text) produced by Coraggio Consulting. Not an official county record. Names and numbers may be misspelled; check the video at the timestamp before quoting.
Speech-to-text: whisper.cpp, model large-v3-turbo. Produced 2026-10-20. Timestamps are [HH:MM:SS] into the meeting video.

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[00:00:01] okay good afternoon everyone thank you for coming to the December 19th 2024 meeting of the Student Services Committee we will get we will we are going to go ahead and get started I understand that Ms. LaBelle is on her way and will be here shortly but because we do have a hard stop by 5:00 p.m.

[00:00:28] preferably at least a little sooner we are going to go ahead and get started just as a reminder committee meetings are audio recorded they are not video recorded they are not live streamed but the audio recording will be available later for download and listening through the LCPS website we are going to start with public comment thank you for engaging with the school board through the public comment process the school board welcomes comments from Loudoun County residents and believes that strong community engagement and outreach are important components of a successful school system.

[00:01:04] Speakers must limit comments to the time allotted. Based on the number of speakers in the agenda this evening, all speakers have been allotted three minutes each for public comment. Please be advised the speakers who missed their time slot will not be called at a later time.

[00:01:21] Briefly about decorum and civility, all audience members shall maintain civility, decorum, and respect for the functioning and dignity of the school board at all times. Please remain seated unless arriving, departing, speaking at the table, or during a break violations of civility decorum and respect include shouting heckling jeering applause or other noise which disrupts or delays the meeting obstructing speakers from being able to see the committee members and vice versa interrupting speakers attempting to speak when not called to do so by the chair and approaching a speaker otherwise attempting to intimidate disparage or distract a speaker staff member or other attendees please refrain from vulgarity obscenities defamation profanity or other lake breaches of respect speakers may not target

[00:01:59] criticize or attack individual students and or individual division employees during public comment um that's fine right violations of decorum or stability by any meeting attendee may result in the chair directing staff to remove the attendee from the remainder of the meeting fine for today right um all right uh we only have one uh speaker signed up for public comment today uh so ms liz crotty um i will set a three minute timer um thank you for sharing remarks

[00:02:34] thank you so these are comments from Valerie Schoenfeld thank you to the committee for recognizing the harmful effects of restraint and seclusion and for your commitment to ensuring student safety and well-being particularly for our more vulnerable students with disabilities I want to share how the misuse of seclusion deeply affected my child with autism and our family my child was frequently taken to a small windowless office where staff blocked the doorway preventing him from leaving on multiple occasions over a four-month time period with some

[00:03:08] incidents lasting up to an hour. While the school claimed this was a de-escalation room the reality is it was forced confinement. There was no support offered to him to de-escalate and it was not a space where he felt safe. I was not notified of any of these incidents. I only found out after my son had a panic attack and shared that he didn't want to go to school because of what was happening to him in this room and how he always felt he was in trouble the trauma has been profound my child has been unable to attend school since February 7th he has suffered severe anxiety loss of trust panic attacks weight loss and disrupted

[00:03:47] sleep these events robbed him of his sense of safety and caused significant regression that we are still working through 11 months later the current redlined policy language includes the phrase provided that no such room or space is locked I urge the committee to expand this language to explicitly include situations where a child is prevented from leaving such as when a staff member blocks the doorway or otherwise restricts the child's ability to exit I urge the committee to ensure that the definition of seclusion includes not only involuntary confinement of a student alone in a room but also situations where a staff member blocks the doorway preventing the child

[00:04:26] from leaving the name or purpose of the room does not change its impact students who feel or understand that they cannot leave must be considered secluded and parents need to be notified additionally staff need more training to respond to behavior proactively focusing on a trauma-informed and neuro affirming practices preventing escalation must be the priority rather than relying on restraint or seclusion after a crisis occurs my child's team reported they didn't know what else to do thank you for your thoughtful consideration as you work to revise this policy with these changes you can ensure all students

[00:05:03] especially those with disabilities are treated with dignity and protected from harm no other family should have to experience what we have thank you thank you Ms. Crowdy and our thanks to Ms. Schoenfeld as well with that we will move on to item 3 on our agenda which is approval of the November 7th 2024 meeting minutes Ms. Mansfield have you had a chance to review the draft minutes Do you have any questions concerns or edits in that case as I have also reviewed them and similarly do not have

[00:05:43] Concerns or proposed edits. So I will make the motion To approve the minutes the motion is improperly moved and seconded all those in favor say aye I the motion passes with ms. LaBelle absent for the vote and Now we will move on to item number three or excuse me item number four Our only information item for this evening Which are the revisions to policy?

[00:06:19] 5345 restraint and seclusion of students miss Smith or is yours? Good evening. We're gonna just go over some some of the basic Background of restraint seclusion we've done this before so if there's any parts you want me just to skip through Please let me know cuz I know we have a limited amount of time This evening so policy 5345 has a number of requirements One of the requirements is the annual reporting of the number of students who have had restraints and seclusions for the division

[00:06:58] instances of them reported by schools and information regarding employee training the Department of Student Services provides training to staff with the implementation to support policy 5345 and the monitoring of the use of restraint and seclusion and as I presented at the end of last year we actually monitor the restraint seclusion incidents every week And follow up on those on a weekly basis Support structures and LCPS that really support Prior to the use of restraint and seclusion some of the preventative pieces of that as well include the multi multi-tiered system of supports

[00:07:36] Annual staff training behavior intervention teams MANT training which also includes the relational MANT UCARU as well as a required documentation system for all incident reporting the multi-tiered systems of supports, we have those across all LCPS locations now.

[00:08:02] Interventions are universal, targeted, and intensive, and it's for all students. Positive behavior interventions and supports, PBIS, is in place. We have social-emotional learning, individualized plans, safe and supportive learning environments for students and staff. It helps to support that.

[00:08:19] There are different layers of training for restraint and seclusion. We have annual training, annual requirements. All LCPS staff are responsible for understanding and supporting student behavior.

[00:08:40] Each school location is required to have a team of trained professionals to respond to student behaviors, and that is the behavior intervention team. The MANT system includes MANT relational and technical skills. We also, so we have trainings for that. We have trainings on the UKERU crisis management system, as well as we utilize the VCU Autism Center of Excellence Safety for All training for our transportation staff.

[00:09:06] And the transportation staff also get trained in MANT for students who are being transported with the intensive needs.

[00:09:23] This chart has a summary of the restraint and seclusion data for 2023, so it's from 2020-2021 to 2022-2023. And we talked about this before the last time I presented.

[00:09:40] This is just the Loudoun County locations. It does not include the private day placements and residential placements. as they have a separate reporting we have separate reporting for those and they also have different regulations that they follow but we do track every incident for our students again for the 2020 2021 school year i just want to do as a reminder and really a an advocate advocacy sort of approach for a public separate school that is the year when we were coming out of the pandemic and we were we brought in our most um unique students with the most unique needs and students who have had the

[00:10:17] most behavioral challenges historically and we had no restraints and no seclusions a large part of that time where they were the only students in the building so there was less transitions less stimulation and all of that resulted in no restraints and seclusions for that school year 21 22 school year we had three restraints for students without disabilities 15 with students with disabilities and the students without disabilities did not have a 504 plan because we also carve that out as a separate data point as well and then in

[00:10:52] 22 23 there were no restraints physical restraints for students without disabilities in six with students with disabilities and the incidence of seclusion again in the 2020 2021 school year there were no incidents 21 22 school year there were five seclusions for students with disabilities and then in the 22-23 school year there were three incidents of seclusions and for mechanical

[00:11:29] restraints the we had none for 21-2021 one mechanical restraint for 21-22 and none for 22-23 and again the mechanical restraint just as a reminder if law enforcement utilizes handcuffs when they are work dealing with any situation it is considered a mechanical restraint for our data unless charges are pressed against the student so that will actually show up on our data even though it's not our seclusion as a division because I mean our mechanical restraint is a division because it's

[00:12:05] prohibited for our staff and that's a CRDC it's a actually an OCR requirement for us to report it that way so the next part is just the updates from the last time we met in May so there are some revisions just an overall general the changes from what you saw in May we formatted the definitions as requested by the Student Services Committee in May from April we maintain the definitions that are permissible and applicable to LCPS in the policy and the remaining

[00:12:43] definitions were moved to the regulation the definitions were organized in alphabetical order for ease of reviewing them and the definitions were also aligned with the Code of Virginia. In prohibited practices, we revised the language for prone restraint to align with the Code of Virginia. What we had was missing some practices from what was in the Code of Virginia. So we added the four practices, the use of seclusion that restricts breathing or harms the student, the use of restraint and seclusion as a punishment or

[00:13:18] discipline, a means of coercion or retaliation, a convenience to prevent property damage or in a manner other than provided by the code of virginia so these are again prohibited practices that we added the use of seclusion rooms or freestanding rooms not meeting the standards set forth in the code and the use of restraint or seclusion when medically or psychologically contraindicated as documented by the iep team or qualified health professional under the scope of the professionals authority so those were things that we added that were not in the original

[00:13:54] policy under the training section again we updated it to align with the Code of Virginia focused on skills related to positive behavior support conflict prevention de-escalation and crisis response all school personnel receive initial training regarding regulations policies procedures governing the use of restraint and seclusion that is a one-time all all school staff are required to do this training and once you do it once you don't have to do that training again and we utilized the ODU training modules that were made

[00:14:32] available when the state implemented this policy advanced training in the use of physical restraint seclusion in every school for one administrator and school personnel assigned to work with students whose IEP or 504 team determines the student is likely to be physically restrained or secluded and initial and advanced training is evidence-based so these were updated the updates to align with the code of Virginia under the monitoring and intervention section there were no substantial changes at all there were just a couple clerical updates and that's the same with the notification and awareness section from again from

[00:15:10] when we met in April under the exceptions the current policy said nothing in this policy prevents a school employee from stopping a physical altercation or to prevent physical harm to a student or other individual it did not apply it does not apply to school resource officers who are performing law enforcement duties. It has been revised to match the code of Virginia as well to state that nothing in the policy or corresponding regulation shall be construed to modify or restrict the initial authority of teachers to remove students as provided in the code of Virginia, the authority

[00:15:50] of a school resource officer or school security officers as provided by the code of Virginia, the authority of the Virginia Department of Juvenile Justice Programs, and then civil immunity afforded to teachers as provided by the Code of Virginia and the juvenile courts is not ours but that was part of the Virginia Code so we just incorporated it as the language in the data collection and reporting it was updated to remove the reference to the assistant superintendent reporting quantitative data to the US Department of Education for the Office of Civil Rights and again when we talked about this the last time that's actually one of the required

[00:16:28] student record collections that we do and then the quantitative data that's reported to the office of civil rights the CRDC that's also required trainings that incorporates a lot of information above and beyond just the restraint and seclusion data and that's done by every school division and then policy formatting we changed all of references to pupil services to student services to align with current policy formatting and division council recommendations we remove the statement about the superintendent promulgating the

[00:17:07] administrative regulations for the implementation of the policy we included legal references to align with recommended policy revisions and cross references were updated to reflect updated policy numbers so that was prior to the last that was the changes from April May to the beginning of the school year but then we did us some more of the changes from the SEAC recommendations so this is that what we didn't get to talk about at the last meeting this section or I think we may have talked about it but we didn't really cover it think we talked about two times ago I think so we amended so the SEAC

[00:17:44] recommendation the first one was to amend the policy to prohibit seclusion and again our response is seclusion is emergency safety procedure utilized when a student's behavior poses eminent danger and is not able to be managed by their crisis intervention strategies or emergency safety procedures the SEAC recommendation to prohibit a restraint from being written into an IEP section 504 plan individual crisis plans or behavior intervention plans again I we we have the Virginia code the regulation in here we actually have to document in

[00:18:20] an IEP if we know a student is likely to engage in behaviors that may make them at risk for requiring a crisis intervention strategy so we don't write it in as or to require to may require restraint or seclusion we don't write it in as an accommodation or a strategy it really is written into and part of that discussion is because of the behavior this is something that may end up happening really to inform the families and as an IEP team discuss other things maybe put other accommodations and strategies in place to put to really prevent that as best possible so the regulatory language was at is in there

[00:18:59] yes quick question where would you put that information would it be in the background information there's actually a section in the IEP regarding behaviors in the present level performance factors for consideration and it goes in there when we when there's a student that's at risk for needing that level of intervention or response and again throughout in the policy if it's not in there for a student and a student has been restrained or secluded and/or secluded more than once the IEP team has to come to the table and really talk about that and document it and that's another time when we would add it if a

[00:19:39] student had had been engaging in those behaviors that required that level of response thank you mm-hmm any other questions for that part for the parent as well does the parent and if the parent brings up these concerns would it be put under the parent concerns absolutely and then would you put a prior written notice for it as well it's all a prior notice will be provided with every IEP. SEAC recommended adding staff to the various references throughout the

[00:20:18] policy and really the way the policy is written that it indicates or others and others would be all individuals in the school or in the location where the student is for when it came to safety. So staff is implied in the use of the term or others. There was a recommendation for physical restraint not to be used on any student under the age of six. We we indicated that school personnel may implement physical restraint only when other interventions are or would be in a reasonable judgment of the school personnel the only really response

[00:20:55] because of the other responses being ineffective so that is there are concerns that we do have children younger than six six and under that are exhibited exhibiting pretty extreme behaviors so if we don't have that in place we would need some other strategy to work with students when when safety is of significant concern but it is a last um so in your uh mant training chapter eight uh page 303 it says children under the age of five are at significantly greater risk for respiratory

[00:21:34] compromise than older children or teenagers due to the lack of development in the muscles used for breathing younger children have greater joint laxity and this makes the joints of children more susceptible to injuries especially at the elbow joint and small children so they don't really recommend that in the training here. You mentioned that there was another training that you provide for the Ukeru. Other training for restraints for children who are under the age of... Oh, I'm sorry.

[00:22:09] They have a small stature supplemental component to the MANT training that does, it's currently supplemental. One of the recommendations that we've been talking about is making it required for all elementary staff it's for small stature and it really if that's all part of the training component as well that section that you're reading as well talks about I think it says it should only be utilized as you know as a last at the very end of it it talks about as sort of as a last result I don't have that in front of me but there's language that's with it that says that it's there are a

[00:22:45] lot of sort of preventative things that we need to be doing and before we go into engaging in a restraint with a student that little but sometimes there is safety concerns so just because of the time constraint we have I am going to ask my fellow committee members to hold questions until the end of until you have finished this presentation do you want me to go through all of these since we went through them last time or this was part we presented on all these changes last time so if you want to if you want me to continue to go through it

[00:23:24] I can but we did go through all of these the last time we were sort of in the end phases of you all just going through discussion so you let me know your preference sorry I miss Smith I I did not recall that we discussed the SEAC recommendations I think Miss Mansfield was virtual that night when we discussed all of those yeah I believe it was October 7th meeting mrs. Mansfield was

[00:23:58] virtual I recall that I just we were in the border yeah even getting to this policy so I'm happy to keep I'm happy to keep going but if there's questions I I don't mind moving straight to the question piece you just tell me what you prefer that may be a more efficient use of our time that agreeable to if miss Smith has essentially already done the presentation for us to go

[00:24:28] to our questions and discussion okay I think that probably makes sense so for for myself I am supportive of adding of adding use of physical restraint for students under the age of six as a prohibited practice so if if there would

[00:25:05] staff have concerns objections to a change like that of adding that in I gave some thought to if we were going to do that where the best place in the policy would be and my my inclination would be that it would make the most sense in the list in Part C prohibited practices to add it possibly under number eight in between eight make it a new number nine use of physical

[00:25:39] restraint on students under the age of six fellow committee members if I may I would recommend possibly making that number one because it's such a change that we make it the very first thing on the policy even better okay so that will be a new number one and we will end up renumbering the other the other items okay in number nine which is what is currently number nine will be number ten

[00:26:16] when we when we add the other one in it states use of seclusion rooms are freestanding units not meeting the standards set forth in 8 vac 20 - 750 - 5 at sec when I was going through the materials for today I did click on that hyperlink and it does it takes you directly to that that regulation 20 - 7 50 - 5 which is the like the general applicability of restraint and seclusion and i would like to see this this site changed to the one that is specifically for

[00:26:53] defining seclusion rooms it needs to go to the 2750-50 so it was a clerical error on that one so we will correct this yes this is hyperlinked it needs to go to dash 50

[00:27:10] I would like to go back to the opening paragraph I know SIAC recommended a few changes to the opening paragraph I at this time I am not in favor of removing

[00:27:47] seclusion entirely I have concerns with the concept of it as a parent with children in the school system and based on anecdotes that I have heard from parents whose children have had difficult circumstances in our school system but I don't think at this time like I said I'm not in support of removing seclusion entirely but with regard to the other recommendations or

[00:28:26] the other parts of that first recommendation I do I'm supportive of the of making this opening paragraph a little bit more forceful regarding the intent of the policy and I was considering proposing a change to the last sentence that currently reads LCPS recognizes restrictive emergency procedures are used as a last resort and my thought would be potentially have is the sentence end there after resort period and then have a new sentence that says the intent of this policy is to ensure that every effort is taken to

[00:29:06] eliminate the use of restraint and seclusion I am in favor of getting rid of seclusion having done it and then looking at our things here it doesn't even look like we're doing it all that much what we are doing is for lack of a better word is timeout of some sort and taking people out and that's therein lies the confusion a lot of the times and and so I would ask the committee to

[00:29:40] think about a I know timeout is a is not is a is a word but I know that talking with miss Richardson there's some other words that she uses that I'm sure she'll let us know but to have that kind of policy where we are requiring that the parents be notified and that the parents also have so that we can track things to see if things are getting worse because I think that's where a lot of this misunderstanding is is within okay so what does seclusion really mean it means

[00:30:17] I guess a shut door and and but but what about if you are preventing a kid from getting out of so so that's that is an excellent point and I I have also spoken with Ms. Richardson. I have similar feelings. I understand because of the legal significance and external requirements from state and federal authorities related to seclusion, there's a very specific legal definition that it seems like there are many, maybe I shouldn't say

[00:30:57] many, there's a non-zero amount of reported circumstances that parents have reported of occasions that a lay understanding, if you said this is seclusion, my child was secluded, that could meet a lay understanding or lay definition of those words, but don't necessarily rise to the level of seclusion as defined in state and federal laws.

[00:31:29] And I think also that it's very important that LCPS needs to have some kind of written guidance framework something addressing those types of situations and I am I think that there are already things that they can I mean I think that there's already in law that if the danger to self and danger to others that would that would help with that the other thing that I think we have to be mindful of is because it's not seclusion

[00:32:04] we're it's still traumatizing to a kid yeah 100 100 and we're and we still need to provide supportive care and we still need to be following and reporting and all of that kind of stuff and that's where and that that's why my my inclination is i would be supportive of of i perhaps a separate freestanding policy to be worked on not today i have hrtd at five in this room we got 20 minutes um yes a separate policy to address

[00:32:41] exactly those concerns to give a name to whatever that practice is because we don't want to call it seclusion because we don't want it to be confused with seclusion um air quotes for the recording air quotes the state and federal definitions of seclusion but to put those safeguards in place to make it clear that there would need that there needs to be parental notification when those things happen that there need to be guidelines as to when it's appropriate and what kind of actions are

[00:33:14] appropriate I am I am supportive of that I don't think that that should be part of this policy that's my feeling I do have I do have a question related to part of the public comment was suggesting that perhaps the situation of this student who was placed in a room not with the door closed and locked but the allegation is that there was a staff member in the doorway preventing the

[00:33:52] student from leaving so is is that right now under the policy as it is currently is that something that we would deem seclusion no and why not because they're not alone and seclusion is alone in a room and not allowed to leave so they're not alone because somebody's with them so if the purse if the door is closed but not locked and there's someone outside watching what that's seclusion because there's nobody in the room with them the room or area I do understand that

[00:34:27] distinction certainly but I have some concerns depending on the circumstances if the adult who is in the room is whether they're interacting with this I mean if the adult is standing there not interacting with the student in any way I'm not I'm not entirely convinced that that should be treated the same as if an adult is in the room and engaged with the student so I think that's a really

[00:35:03] great sort of topic to talk about because sometimes when children are in crisis if you talk to them you cause them to go deeper into the crisis and so engaging sometimes overstimulates the student and part of that is the training that we need to do when those and so that our staff know how to work with the students because nobody should be secluding a student that hasn't had the training and then there are also other members of the BIT team that would be there to support those so sometimes you're engaging in a seclusion you're in not a seclusion but in those type of situations when you're in the room with the student and you don't engage with that student until they sort of can

[00:35:42] de-escalate some and then you talk them through it or you sometimes students you talk them down as part of it so it depends on the needs of the student as to how that interaction would be but when you leave them alone in a room and you shut the door and you're on the outside of the door or the area watching them and they're not allowed to leave that's seclusion but you have to know each individual student's needs on how you're going to respond because talking to a student can actually heighten their level of crisis.

[00:36:14] I don't recall if it was said just now in this meeting, but I'm aware it has previously been said that LCPS does not have seclusion rooms. That's correct. I mean, in what sense?

[00:36:30] Just in the sense that we don't have any rooms that are designated as this is our seclusion room? Because I would assume that any room can be made into a seclusion room if you are putting a child in the room and then closing the door. would say any area or room could be utilized to seclude a student but we don't in our buildings designate seclusion rooms because we actually are not promoting the use of seclusion some private schools some public separate schools some public schools have separate rooms that are the sole purpose is for seclusion what is what would you call the room that's empty

[00:37:07] next to a self-contained classroom that's empty or that is empty that they use I guess when you're saying empty you mean that it doesn't have students in it on a routine basis or has nothing furniture it has pads in there I'm not aware of any of those rooms in our building so if we have those certainly if we have any of those then we need to be informed because that is not a supportive practice that's why we have specifically as a division the office of

[00:37:44] special education particularly for our students with disabilities has supported our schools in creating star rooms which are safe sensory friendly spaces that are structured opportunities students are never left alone sometimes it's a choice sometimes it's an option to go to those areas but we should never have a space that is empty with pads in it and if you have knowledge of that please let us know so when you talk about star rooms can you describe that for me sure our star rooms are set up we have several school locations Lowes Island

[00:38:22] Legacy Elementary have set up a star room I believe Creighton's Corner has a star room so it is a space with which staff from the Office of Special Education as well as staff at the building level have worked with the principal to identify a space it has nice lighting around the ceiling we have added movable flexible seating their sensory activities there's things on the walls there's music there's defined areas where students can go to they're always there with an adult the specific example that most recently comes to mind

[00:39:00] is the one at Lowe's Island there's a sign in and sign out they have a it's a smaller space so they are very thoughtful about the number of students that are in that space they have like one of those rocky things that students can get on they have beanbag chairs again there's sensory textured things that are on the walls the space that at legacy is larger it's a larger physical space but they have some of those similar sensory friendly activities for students to engage in again the time that I was at Lowe's this school year

[00:39:35] students chose to go there instead of going to outside recess I can give one other example that I'm aware of as well at Newton Lee the competent learner model team worked with mr. lines and they they have an entire room it does they have padding on the walls but they also have over like a rock climbing part but it doesn't go high the whole floor has a padded floor and there's all kinds of sensory activities and balls and lights and everything there but it's not just a padded room that's empty for they actually students actually go in there

[00:40:10] to do activities but it's a it's gives them a place to be able to also separate sometimes there's too much going on in a classroom and students get over stimulated so oftentimes principals are putting extra classrooms next to our program classrooms so that they can sometimes separate the students and work in different groups or for students getting over stimulated some students can go to another room to give a little bit of space so I know that those happened but they're not just empty padded rooms so I'm not aware of any other rooms oh I guess it was the carrying that was there not just added

[00:40:48] around like you would see in an inpatient or something but I don't know sometimes they're storing pads I do care pads are supposed to be just part of a regular classroom if they're like if we're utilizing them they're just supposed to be around the room so they become fairly normal part of a classroom environment for the students as well they sit on them they read on them like they're just part of the classroom so I don't know if some schools are storing them in different places because when a bit team responds they need to be able to get to the pads so I if we knew exact an example of a school that you may be talking about we would definitely want to look into that though definitely

[00:41:24] chair Donahue can I get some clarification I wrote yes I don't know that I caught all of your recommendation and I didn't know where you sort of landed for the recommendation for the opening paragraph oh sure so my suggestion was at line 8 we end the sentence after last resort and then have an and then start a new sentence that would say the intent of this policy is to ensure that every effort is taken to eliminate the use it's taken to

[00:42:02] eliminate the use is that what you said thank you it's taken to eliminate the

[00:42:05] use well you've been very quiet the two questions or the one major question that

[00:42:45] I had the last time we went through this was are there protections for the teachers, if a student is going after them, and it's happened. It's happened to me. I've had chairs thrown at me, books thrown at me. You all know that I was not walking, and that was because somebody had hold of me and twisted my hip. So there has to be some protections for teachers and assistants or other staff that are attempting to cope with a child, especially if it's one of our larger children that is out of control and i think we've put that in there if i'm not mistaken

[00:43:24] thank you i i'm with you too i mean the teacher and that's why it's so i mean being in that position and having to have restrained kids and in restrain seclusion rooms and in patient hospitals and things like that and having my own trauma related to it um it the as soon as you put hands on a kid you're the risk for the teacher and everything goes up severely um and so that's why I like at this policy where it says every effort shall be taken to eliminate that and that that's not our go-to because there have been instances where

[00:44:03] I know that it in the past of 20 years ago was the was the go-to so I do appreciate that and I do think that part of my reason not to do it is because I want I'm thinking of the teachers one other thing I wanted to clarify I'm not necessarily recommending any changes here but the the title of the policy and

[00:44:40] many many many places throughout the policy including procedures for appropriate use section D starting on line 180 of the red line all say physical restraint and seclusion I just want to clarify when we say this when we use it it's not one phrase physical restraint and seclusion as a thing that is happening is that correct like what we mean is these things apply if restraint is being used or if seclusion is being used or if they're being used together.

[00:45:10] So they really could never be used together because if you're physically restraining a student they're not alone and you can't physically restrain a student if they're secluded because they're alone. So I could say the use of physical restraint and the use of seclusion if you feel like that would help clarify that but you can't use them together because there's no way to use them together based on their definitions. Could we say the use of a physical restraint and/or and that should take care of it you might be using one you might have these both in the process or you might just be using

[00:45:47] seclusion did that help any I think she just said that we can't use and because I mean yeah because it is you can't use them both at the same time as according to their definitions as restraining you would be actually be with the student you would actually be restraining this clue as opposed seclusion where nobody would be in there so perhaps so I do have this I do have suggestions um so my my my suggestions I

[00:46:25] think would be on line 11 part a where we say authorized emergency safety procedures that we say proceed you know the subtitle with the underlying period space space and then instead of starting it with physical restraint and seclusion procedures say procedures for physical

[00:46:48] restraint or seclusion apply to all students I recommend doing procedures for the use of physical restraint and the use of seclusion apply to all

[00:47:20] students that's fine with me procedures yes okay and I think that it would be a good idea to make a similar change on line 180 for Part D procedures for the appropriate use of physical restraint at least at the at the heading I think we should make a similar change their procedures for the appropriate use of physical restraint and appropriate use of seclusion or seclusion something to

[00:47:58] make it really clear that we're talking about separate things probably being overly particular miss LaBelle share do you feel comfortable with leaving it restraint and seclusion of students or do you want to do something to separate separate them at the title of this as well I mean we call it seclusion and restraint or restraint and seclusion right I'm I'm I'm comfortable with the as it is since we are discussing both things broadly I don't have I don't think

[00:48:32] I have strong feelings about it to change that I mean I I have so many other thoughts and questions related generally to this topic I was but I was going to say some of them I'm not sure that they can be addressed in policy anyway like

[00:49:07] looking at looking at lines 96 through 112 ish of the red line seclusion is blah blah blah but does not include various situations you know looking at it as as Ms. Mansfield was saying earlier if these are looking at it from the point of view of the adults who are in trying to figure out how to manage a situation, it seems to me, right, the difference between a behavioral intervention

[00:49:41] timeout versus, you know, under Part C versus under Part E, removal of a student for a short time to regain self-control, or removal of a student for disruptive behavior. I'm trying to imagine, you know, if you're the student, each of these interactions might feel the same in its impact on you and being mindful of how do we how do we best reduce the harm that is being caused to the students and the staff when in cases where anything like this may become

[00:50:19] any anything like these actions may become necessary. But I also you know from the perspective of the staff who have to make these split second decisions on how to engage I don't even know what if I have question here but it's it's tricky having these you know I feel like some of the categories on this page are very easy to wrap my head around right like we're not gonna call it seclusion if a student is being questioned because of criminal activity by law enforcement I get that you know but we have you know

[00:50:57] in school suspension detention like I get those if a student requests a break that makes sense too then the other ones just definitely feel a little different you know because if you're the student how do you know what is happy you know you don't know what's happening in them in the moment necessarily but I don't again like I don't know that that is an issue that can be addressed in policy as opposed to if if there are improvements to be made and I don't know that there are but maybe there are that that might be more appropriate in

[00:51:36] regulation or training I know we're running out of time so I'm going to try to make it short and helpful generally when a teacher's in the class she gets to know her kids and it is a series or progression of solutions that you are trying to de-escalate behavior so you might start with just a short shh somebody else is talking be patient or can we try this over here or would you like to go and and take a few minutes to sit over there where would you like to

[00:52:12] sit and and then it progresses if the behavior escalates then you might have to go to the next level if the child agrees at some point and then sits down and and gets it together again that's good if not then you might go to the next level so it is a series of steps that you take rather than just one application if I may I would also just like to add that I would agree 100% it's a hugely stressful situation for all involved when you do have to use restraint and seclusion but part of the process with the training that occurs

[00:52:48] and the process after something like that happens is we do debriefing to talk about what happened what else could we do to prevent this happening again so try to figure out what what happened that resulted in that level of need for a student being in crisis and we also do those with that with a student as well so I'm not going to negate adrenaline pumps you get really exhausted emotionally and physically from doing when you have to engage in these type of responses but

[00:53:23] we do have things in place to sort of walk through that and support the staff and the students when it occurs and the family I did not realize the time that it is right now all right so it is 501 so to date we have your revisions that we've talked about today we've made note of those we've asked for clarity next time when this comes back when we scheduled for January would you like it

[00:53:58] rescheduled as information or as action or we could propose a work session on this item again mrs. Smith had reached out to some building level leaders and teachers and had had them prepared back in October to come speak to you all so we could set up a structure very similar to what we did for 8155 so you can hear

[00:54:35] the school perspective and the words that you were looking for our isolation and exclusion so we could work on something to further define and support they reporting to parents and documentation of those incidences but I do want to respect the time of the HR TD committee miss Richardson is there any way you could give me a list of all of the different trainings because it looks like there's another LCPS training as well on top of man and on top of Vancouver there's a whole list I am I am

[00:55:11] conflicted because I would like to bring this back for action but I also would like to hear from some of the speakers who were planning to be who were here in October and that we were not able to hear from and I'm not sure how to balance that little though if we get together and do a work session earlier in January before our next meeting then we might be ready for action we if we could engage the people that were coming as speakers to be able to be here that

[00:55:47] would be very helpful and would still finally bring this to a conclusion just to thought is that is a good goal committee members and miss Richardson do y'all think that that could potentially be feasible to have a work session in

[00:56:15] January and then also a committee meeting I think that's what we would like to try and do miss Richardson perhaps over email related to scheduling okay so our tentative plan is going to be to try and schedule a work session for further discussion of 53:45 in January in advance of our next committee meeting for student services which on the agenda says it will be

[00:56:55] January 16th which is going to have to be changed because I believe we have a school board budget session that night but we will coordinate about that hopefully bring this back for action in January is there any new business no there any new business nope okay okay this meeting is adjourned thank you everyone apologies for going over be safe getting home and have a great break

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