Coraggio Consulting
Loudoun County School Board, Student Services Committee Work Session, Thursday, April 23, 2026

Date: Thursday, April 23, 2026
Place: Loudoun County Public Schools / School Board meeting (see BoardDocs / LCPS-TV)
Length: 1h 2m (video)
Official meeting video (Vimeo / LCPS-TV): https://player.vimeo.com/video/1183901200?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 2026-10-11. Timestamps are [HH:MM:SS] into the meeting video.

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[00:00:17] Good afternoon everybody good afternoon yeah we don't need to do the good afternoon thing it's not it's not official. My name is John Pepper I am the chair of the Student Services Committee and I am going to call this second work session on policy 5342 order.

[00:00:37] The first thing that we are actually going to do is kind of a weird little hiccup that only involves three of us but we have to approve the minutes of the previous work session. However, in going through this, I have found a small mistake in the minutes, and so what I would like to bring to the attention is the committee members present.

[00:01:03] Ms. Carrie LaBelle is not listed as a committee member present, and she was definitely present at the meeting last time. So if we could add school board member Ms. Carrie LaBelle as well. And with that and you are here today I am joined by fellow school board members Carrie LaBelle from the Catoctin district and school board member as well school board chair April Chandler from the Algonquian district who are also members of the committee.

[00:01:33] And with that from either of my two co-committee members I will take a motion to approve the minutes with the change. So moved. Thank you. That motion has been moved by Ms. Chandler and seconded by Ms. LaBelle.

[00:01:48] Is there any discussion? Seeing none. All of those in favor of approving the minutes from the last work session please say aye aye aye aye and that has passed unanimously and with that we will begin our second work session and I will turn it over to um Miss Richards and our assistant superintendent uh Department of Student Services. Thank you Chair Pepper. I appreciate that. Um so thank you all for being here. We do have two new members joining us from LEAF.

[00:02:16] We have Sarah and Monique joining us thank you so much for being a part of this very important work. So you guys are going to be working as tabletops but we're going to start with just a quick sort of overview right. So we were asked as staff members to create this policy because there's circumstances again that happen within the educational setting that don't rise to the level of restraint or seclusion and seclusion in LCPS is a prohibited practice but lots of

[00:02:50] discussion around our restraint and seclusion policy policy 5345 about how might we capture and document when these incidences do happen so that parents are informed and that educational planning teams are coming back together to really talk about getting to the root cause of these behavioral interruptions. So here is your reference policies so if you clicked the link and your director assigned to your table has access to

[00:03:25] these links and there should be copies in your packets. These are the supporting policies that that complement this newly proposed policy 5340 that we'll be working with so during the first work session we did sections A through D and so we'll go through and here's a summary of that work right so for each section what are our observations as a tabletop what is the impact of this particular

[00:04:01] section and then what were some recommendations and so this is just a high-level summary I have all of the detailed comments but really when looking at observations definitely the tabletops we're talking about we need to be clearer in our language and more consistent throughout so sometimes in the policy for example we said educational setting versus educational environment right and so could that be confusing to the unfamiliar reader or to teachers and administrators that really have to implement this policy really

[00:04:41] wanted some of the feedback was to really focus on de-escalation first as an observation there was a mixed sort of feedback on definitions some tabletops thought we didn't need the definitions and then some thought we needed that the definitions that were there and some additional definitions certainly then maybe further building out the environmental structures for where we have this safe and supportive removal working with schools on designated spaces like where might we be taking our

[00:05:18] students when they need these breaks. And then there was feedback on the overall tone of the policy came across the tone for some tabletops was a little too punitive right. And so how might we make it more student focused and softer in its approach more supportive shall we right.

[00:05:39] our impact. How are we really going to be documenting, right? Where is the documentation of the removals going to be maintained within the educational record? In what format are parents going to receive this documentation? What is the frequency that they can expect to receive this documentation? And really wanting our practice of implementing this policy and documenting things to be transparent and very clear to everyone that we serve building a shared understanding right so and that sort of

[00:06:16] leads to that next bullet in that impact column of we don't want this policy to be misused overused we don't want it to feel like a disciplinary measure for any of our students we we don't want our parents to walk away with the feeling that this was a disciplinary measure so how might we look at the impact that this policy might have and then again looking at the implementation and consistency across a hundred school sites okay the recommendations very much

[00:06:54] similar clarify the criteria for use and so might that there were some dialogue in the notes might that be a supporting regulation that really bullets those that that criteria out just so the policy doesn't get too cumbersome documentation and monitoring again reiterating the prohibited practices and then several recommendations of once we get the policy across the line really making our professional learning for our staff and our administrators more

[00:07:30] scenario based actually helping them to walk through the scenarios that they often experience on a daily basis across their their schools and then helping teams as part of this process come up with decision-making frameworks what meets the threshold of okay we're going to try these strategies in class versus when do we need to implement the safe and supportive removal of a student so coming up with a flow chart or maybe level of disruption level of

[00:08:04] dysregulation so we really had some amazing feedback from our first session and again that was just a very high-level summary and so for our time today we're going to focus on sections E through I okay so as tabletops these are your ground rules for feedback and you guys did an amazing job the first time that we were here so let's focus on policy right because this policy has to support all 81,000 that we serve so we can't focus on individual students or

[00:08:42] individual student populations we have to think about how does it serve all of our students when you're providing your feedback and the tabletops did an excellent job during our first work session please be specific actionable and constructive and you guys gave some really great feedback use evidence or examples like you can give us egg you know egg examples of language that how like how we might need to rephrase certain aspects of the verbiage that's in the policy try to avoid repetition because we're going to have to take this

[00:09:21] again synthesize it and then revise this policy so you are really helping us do the work of building this policy for the good of all of those that we serve in LCPS. All right so you get some just a little bit of quiet time to yourselves as individuals right to please look at sections E through I as individuals before you do your tabletop work look at it through the lens of what's clear and

[00:09:56] what's confusing in sections E through I what might be some concerns that you have through your lens or some gaps that you identify and then certainly write down some notes on your policy copy of any suggestions or alternative

[00:10:16] approaches give you about two minutes of think time okay now we're going to

[00:14:17] transition to our tabletop work and I know that might not have been enough time but certainly you'll have some more time as you work through sections E through I as a tabletop group. So at your tables, you need to choose someone who, well, the facilitator has kind of been chosen for you. That is one of the DSS directors that is assigned to your table.

[00:14:42] But you do need to choose someone to be a timekeeper, a note taker, and then who is going to report out for your tabletop group. So you need to assign those roles. And then for each section, you're going to work through very similarly to the same way we did for sections A through D you're going to be looking at it as a collective group it's certainly taking your individual sort of here's my first impression right on observation.

[00:15:14] So what is clear and what's unclear and so pull the language from the policy so we know sort of where we need to target to start making those changes impact. what are the implications for staff for students and families and then what are your recommendations for each section moving forward. So the DSS director assigned to your table is going to be taking notes live within the document and it will be posted again with all of those live notes into board docs after we meet and then certainly you want to make sure that the way that you're

[00:15:53] capturing that information that your your table has come to the consensus of yes that's how we would like things captured okay all right so each tabletop this time has two sheets to type in because folks added some extra sheets which was absolutely fine so each tabletop has two sheets this time to type in and capture that work and so now you'll have about 30 minutes to work as a tabletop and then we'll come back together and we'll report out and then I'll turn the meeting

[00:16:28] back over to Chair Pepper and he will guide us through our next steps. So choose your roles and it's time to dig into sections E through I. Thank you.

[00:16:39] Okay, it is time for us to come back together.

[00:48:45] So if you could finish typing that last thought that you had, I want to refresh the presentation so I can have your tabletop notes up. Your reporter should be ready to share. We'll just go around and do just sort of one main thing from each table because certainly we have all of the notes and thoughts captured.

[00:49:10] Are you guys ready for me to refresh? Okay, I didn't want you to lose anything. I still see people typing. Okay, but reporters, be ready. I know, an hour goes by fast.

[00:49:31] again I told table three unless you're on the treadmill exactly right yeah yeah all right so table one are you ready to get us started gonna report out on one of your main sort of takeaways please okay okay yep no table one we're gonna start here thank you okay so we will we will start there there are two one I'm

[00:50:04] going to start with this it's not a takeaway but I then the we felt like some of these sections were a little bit out of order. So thought of the idea of swapping the positions of E and F and also taking I and sticking it on the backside of D because they kind of fit together as well it didn't really feel like accountability.

[00:50:29] But all of that being said one of the big takeaways is in the supervision and student support in Section G. This is going to require staffing because who is responsible for monitoring these people who is responsible reminding the people these students that are removed knowing that we are already stretched extraordinarily thin with you're not going to take a teacher out of the educational setting we're not going to take an instructional assistant away from supporting a student who might have that accommodation you're going to perhaps take an administrator away or a school counselor away so how do we ensure that there is a person available to monitor a student who has

[00:51:07] been removed from the educational settings that was a really big takeaway and what that might look like staffing and financially. Thank you, Table 1. Table 2? Okay, we felt the same way as Table Top 1 that we would also, we felt like E and F needed a little kind of flip-flop.

[00:51:38] We spent some time in E talking about the concerns. Yeah, I just don't know this table. It just where it talked about the communication, putting in making sure that the communication, interventions are attempted prior to notification happening once removal has happened that was a big part for us in E and then the other section where it talks about the student and parent would get information regarding the incident

[00:52:17] must also to be documented we suggested that that last line which is 60 67 and 68 be changed to communication with the students, parents, guardians regarding the incident must also be documented because we really didn't understand what the copies were on 68.

[00:52:46] And then with F, we had some questions and observations about the time of the notification. On line 72, it says parents must be notified within 24 hours. could we change that to parents or guardians must be notified as soon as possible but within 24 hours and why not by the end of the day and then we suggested removing on line 73 including when the removal or break is planned as part of the students instructional day we suggested adding except when the

[00:53:25] removal is outside of an existing accommodation as defined in B2 am I jumping ahead are we still on no you're good okay no thank you And then in line 76, we suggested using removal instead of action, although we don't really like the word removal, but if we're going to use that, it should be yes, or incident, instead of action. Action felt wrong.

[00:53:56] Then we had NG as well with table one, talking about the staff that not only would be visually monitoring the student, but also what de-escalation techniques are they implementing, trained on, who will it be?

[00:54:18] Also, on line 81, I don't know if you addressed this because I was still trying to figure out this table, but we didn't like that sentence saying students must remain under continuous visual supervision. We thought that sounded punitive, so we suggested students will receive continuous visual supervision.

[00:54:38] And then to piggyback on that line 83, the suggested verbiage would be designated areas must be safe and developmentally appropriate with trained staff assisting with de-escalation and self-regulation techniques.

[00:54:57] - Thank you, table two. - Table three. - I mentioned adding section talk about re-entry, about timing and what spoke about designated areas being in every school or just having that defined.

[00:55:27] And then up in section E talking about when it says any instance, is this going to be something that's only stuff that's outside of an accommodation? Is it going to be all this last time or, you know, every single time a child is removed?

[00:55:45] And some of the times this happens all of the time. But we had also talked about, like, you know, once you're in secondary school, you do, like, middle and high school, you talk, you ask kids, like, hey, can I talk to you in the hallway for a minute? That's a removal. We need to send a note home every time, clarifying that.

[00:56:02] Thank you, Table 3. Table 4.

[00:56:25] Similarities to other groups, but then I think we had some things that have not been said. so in E we did talk about what is the definition of student record because we do know across the division you say student record is that the Q you know so just really clearing up a clear definition of where we will be filing this because that could result in inconsistent filing who is responsible so what staff are responsible for this documentation is that just admin are deans included SSAs like might we want to determine who that is otherwise it fall through the cracks because everyone says not it and that's not good and then what is the timeline for documentation we do have a timeline for parent

[00:57:05] notification but not for the documentation the example we talked about student comes home we get a call here we go look in the system we see nothing that was yesterday why isn't it there so we just suggested by close of business the day of the incident would make sure that we are informing all stakeholders in case someone is looking for that F method is it really defined which could result in inconsistent or untimely communication so phone call or email if that's what we're looking for both one or the other just kind of clear that up and then what is the time frame of the parent meeting where it says you

[00:57:42] know a parent meeting should happen this might be pushed out too far from the incident and then it's not relevant or people have lost context for what actually happened during that time so we suggested maybe within five school days and if this is a student with a disability that already has an IEP then this meeting should be in the form of an IEP meeting not just a parent meeting G timeline there's no timeline for the removal or the reentry like how long can these last what turns into an actual removal that's considered a suspension so do we need to clarify that because students could be in danger of missing

[00:58:19] much instructional time so i put consider and then we didn't really know how much was enough 30 minutes to an hour what constitutes enough for a removal that counts as a day towards 10. felt like we needed more time to discuss that so we didn't get to an actual recommendation we just know that something needs to be there um staff is not defined again who who is going to be doing it who are the trained people with case manager counselors ssa's admin who can be allowed to do this and who will be training them and what does that training look like and then what are the qualifiers for re-entry obviously in our star rooms and different things we have a checklist of what is stabilized for this particular

[00:58:58] student that might be different for each student calm hands calm body what are the identifiers that are telling us that this student is ready for re-entry almost done I promise age define regularly we thought that was too vague we believe that schools need to be reviewing data quarterly because if we wait annually we could have like jacked this up all year right so and kids could have been removed for too long or we could be misusing it for the wrong reason so we do think schools need to be reviewing data quarterly division level we're cool with that being annually and then in I our question was will there be fidelity checks ongoing PD and corrective measures because

[00:59:38] without these steps problems could persist without change for too long and that's harmful to students and the possibility of retraining after each quarterly meeting when inconsistencies or misuse has been identified or has occurred based on the fidelity checks and all of that that is it it was quite a bit but we are done thank you tables one through four certainly appreciate it so next step staff will again take this information we will synthesize it we have not taken the feedback from a through D and started making any

[01:00:16] revisions we wanted to make sure we did a complete review of the policy and got all of your feedback because a lot of it is connected and so the current plan is that all policy feedback will be integrated into a newly revised policy which is slated to come before the Student Services Committee on May 21st to 2026 at 4:30 as an information item and so at this time I turn the meeting back over to Chair Pepper.

[01:00:46] Thank you Ms. Richardson first of all I want to thank everybody for their really hard work on this. One of the things that we've talked about is we're going to see how policy 5340 comes out and when it's revised with all of our suggestions obviously it's going to be sent to all of our respective groups again for your feedback and you always give us such great feedback that we really do appreciate it.

[01:01:10] If we did need one more work session to put little tweaks in there the possibility of having it but I'm really excited to see how this policy comes out and so right now there's nothing on the schedule but that may change as we get into May and have further discussions on the information item. So thank you all so very much for all of your help and all of the care and support that you give all of our students at LCPS and with that I am going to adjourn the work session.

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