Transcript of 2/24/17 AEDY Webinar:
Transition Planning and Transitions
Dana Klouser:(silence) Good morning everyone and welcome to the monthly AEDY team webinar. This is our first go at it since Ryan left us but we will persevere. With us is John and Michelle Nutter and this is Diana. We're going to talk today about transitions and transition planning. There's nothing new as far as updates from the team. We're still working with leader to get the new computer system or application whatever you want to call it up and running. We still have some work to do on that. We're going to be asking a couple of people to help us out with testing that at some point. But that's I think were maybe a month or two down the road on that. So at this time, I'm going to turn it over to Michelle Nutter who is going to talk about transition.
Michelle Nutter:Hey everybody, happy, beautiful spring-like Friday. Thank you for tuning in. I noticed that our numbers are a little lower than normal. We were not able to get our normal Penn*link out in time. And I think that may have contributed to the lower numbers, but as always we'll be recording this, and we'll put the session up on the website. So if you know of folks who were not able to be present, just let them know that they can use the link that they got in their original announcement to get in if they want to get online before we actually post that. And before we get into the meat of the presentation. I'd like to ask you if you have more than one person sitting at your computer, could you just type in how many people are present with you, so that we can get an accurate count for the Webinar.
Dana Klouser: And then also if you don't mind if you ... Can we just see a show of hands to make sure everyone's hearing us? We got hands.
Michelle Nutter:Awesome. Thank you.
Dana Klouser:Got hands and I know that after Michelle talks about transitions, we'll do a little Q&A type your questions into the question box and we'll respond.
Michelle Nutter:OK. So last month's Webinar I talked in depth about formal periodic reviews and I just want to mention that when we talk about transitions and transition planning, often it's the formal periodic review that triggers the start of a transition plan, because that is the point in time that we're looking at the student's progress to see where they are with regard to meeting their behavioral goals. For those of us who have had site visits or have tuned in to other trainings or webinars, we do encourage you to have academic and attendance goals although those cannot be used to keep the student in placement. The thing that triggers transition is when a student has met their behavioral goals.
You know in the past we always said that if a student is place for truancy, you can have an attendance school that is used to make a determination around transition. I'm not stressing that as much today because as many of you know we have had changes to the PA School Code that will be effective next school year. And the big change for us in AEDY is that truancy will be eliminated as one of the reasons for placement. So we will go from having currently seven reasons for placement to starting with 17-18 only having six, with truancy being eliminated. So when we do those formal periodic reviews and remember they are required once per semester, although you can certainly do them as often as you like. We are looking at the student's progress to determine whether or not they have met those behavioral goals.
That is the only question that we're looking at as far as is the students ready to begin a transition plan or not? We get questions all the time about well, mom and dad really want Johnny to stay in the program even though Johnny's doing a great job. Can that happen? And the answer is No. We need to begin transitioning Johnny. And it can't be at the student's request either. Once the student has met those behavioral goals, we need to start the transition plan. Now the only exception to that statement is that if the student is expelled for a specific amount of time, for example, a student brings a weapon to school and they are expelled for one year, we recommend that one of their behavioral goals they use that is worded like students must fulfill the terms of the expulsion. This way if all the other behavioral goals are around not bringing a weapon to school, around making better decisions, around withstanding peer pressure – whatever those goals are they, you would write for that student, one is that additional fulfill the terms of the expulsion. That way when they meet those other behavioral goals they know that they're still having to remain in the program until the end of the one-year expulsion. Otherwise, if we forget to add that goal, then once the student has met the other behavioral goals according to the school code and AEDY guidelines, the students should begin transition. So that puts us between a rock and a hard place between the requirements of the AEDY guideline and the terms of the student's expulsion. So the easy remedy for that is just making sure that we have an expulsion goal as one of the behavioral goals.
So when we say that the student is ready to begin transition once they have met their behavioral goals, please know that that does not mean that we want them to end in an AEDY program on Friday, and start back full time in the regular school on Monday. The transition plan should be as short or as long as the student needs to be successful. We often say that these transition plan should be designed to prevent fires or flare-ups rather than trying to put them out. So meaning there that we don't start a student in a situation that is going to be volatile or hard for them to keep on that good track. So we often will tell schools find the place where the students is most successful and really wants to return.
So for some students, that might be extracurricular activities that is the first piece of their transition plan may be that they continue attending the daytime program in the AEDY setting but they're allowed to participate in clubs or sports after school. And see how that goes. And if they do really well, then we move to that next step. For other kids maybe clubs and sports aren't the things for them. But what if they really, really enjoy history class and had a connection with their history teacher, it makes a logical transition point for that particular student. We want them to begin that transition where they're successful. Now for some of us, logistics make it really hard to do one class a day or half day transition. For some of us that might make the most sense to do one full day in the regular ED setting with the other four still remaining and all that.
And we typically say Wednesday is a great day if you're just going to do a one day transition because they have Monday and Tuesday to get them geared up and ready to test their wings on Wednesday. They have one day in the building and then they have two days to come back to the setting to regroup. And once we see that one day is successful, then we go to two days. Again these transitions can be as longer or as short as the student needs for success. The whole goal of this transition period is to help the students see that they have new skills that will help them be successful wherever they are.
We don't want them to get into the mindset that they can only be successful in the AEDY program. We want them to truly see that all of the work that they are doing with you in learning to replace bad behaviors and make better choices are skills that they're going to take back to another school setting or out into the workforce. That's the whole goal of this program.
John Esposito:Tony, you're saying that you're only seeing your webinar page, should you be seeing something more pertinent? No, because we haven't put anything up to share. So what you seeing is what you should be seeing at this time.
Michelle Nutter:We are not putting any slides up, unfortunately, all you get to do is listen to me. But hopefully I'm giving good information, and that's helpful for you. So the transition plan really should be absolutely individual for the student. It shouldn't be cookie cutter like we're going to start every student in math class or we're going to start every student with one day a week. It really needs to be designed for the needs of that student. Sometimes we have kids that are really good kids, straight-A, honor roll student government, student-athlete, and they make one bad choice that is a big enough bad choice that it leads them to placement in AEDY. For that type of student, the transition plan may be relatively short.
They may be able to fulfill their time in AEDY, meet their goals and be able to very quickly transition full time back into the regular ED setting. And that's perfectly fine because again it is looking at the individual needs of that student. But we know we've got other kiddos that there's a whole host of factors that are going on and insecurity and lack of self-esteem or self-confidence, can be a huge part of whether or not a transition plan is successful. And so for that kiddo, the transition may be weeks to months in duration. Again if it's that thought that we want them to be able to transfer their skills and see that the skills have transferred and build their confidence and their self-esteem and being able to be successful in the regular ED setting.
The piece that is so important about making sure that the transition plan makes sense for the students is that we're able to ramp up or ramp down as needed. So say we get a kiddo and we start with one day a week and it's going great. And we moved it two days a week, and it's going great, and we moved to three days a week, and it starts falling apart. Well, let's pull back and regroup. We might pull back to two days or two one day to see okay, what went right? What went wrong? What supports were missing that by day three you felt like if it wasn't working for you? And then try again. It's that if at first, you don't succeed try, try again.
We're going to continue to figure out what is going to work for that student. So I often think about the transition period as teaching a student how to ride a bike. When they're in our program, they've got their training wheels on full time. And as they come back to you the training wheels are still there and gradually, we're lifting up a little bit, a little bit, until we take them off. And we're holding those handlebars, running alongside and then we're able to finally let go, and they're able to take off on their own. I think that that has to be our goal. We're going to support them to success. And again thinking that those transitions should be as long or as short as the individual student needs them. The other piece that's really important about the transition phase is that while they are in there, they are considered an AEDY student, but they are able to co-mingle with regular ED student.
So all the things that we talk about during site visit or during our training about you're not allowed to co-mingle because students in AEDY have been deemed to present such a safety risk to themselves or disruptions to the educational process to a marked degree such that other students can't learn. And that's why they can't co-mingle. But once they meet their behavioral goals, and are deemed to be ready to transition or in transition, they are allowed to co-mingle. So that's one piece that we can think about. It lessens that requirement to make sure that the student isn't having interaction with non AEDY students. There was a question.
John Esposito:I just wanted to jump in for those who that might be joining us a little late. Again there's no presentation with this webinar, so, audio is all you really need right now. Okay, thank you.
Michelle Nutter:And the other piece that's important with the transition is, while the student is deemed to be in-transition, they are still designated as under their current placement. So if everything hits the fan and it goes totally wrong, we can pull back and see what needs to be done. So, for example, say a student can transition, and they have a major violation, we can move them out of transition, put them back full time into the AEDY program, and the new referral is not required because they are still considered to be under that referral in the first place. So that is helpful to know that while they're in-transition if it goes wrong, we can remove them back to the AEDY setting full time without having to do a whole new set of AEDY paperwork.
The flip side of that, of course, is if we transition, and it's going well, and we get to the point that the student is fully transitioned, that means they're no longer an AEDY student, they are now a regular ED student. If at that point, the student has an incident that would warrant placement in an AEDY program that triggers a brand new referral process. So making sure that if it's not one of the big three that you have all the prior required interventions of administrative guidance to sat in place, you're doing a brand new form and you are holding an informal hearing prior to replacing the students in the program. I think I've pretty much-covered everything with regard to what those plans can look like.
And again think about what is in the best interest of the student. Is it one class? Or half a day? If logistically you're able to do that. Or is it certain days of the week if logistically you're able to put them in just in of course that they really like. Hack, we've seen some kids that for in-house programs their transition starts with lunch period. So they're still having all their academics with the AEDY kids but, they want to test the waters and see can we see success in a "crazy environment" like the cafeteria can sometimes see how that works. Or we can look at extracurriculars. Obviously, we want to start from where the student is going to be successful. And think about the length of time being whatever the student needs. So sometimes it's going to go really quick and be perfectly smooth. And for other kiddos, it might take several months, and it might be ... We get up to a certain level and then we have to pull back and readjust. There is no specific right answer of what a transition looks like simply because it has to be based on the needs of the student. We know that there are districts that utilize in-house transition classrooms or at-risk classrooms as a stepping stone back into the regular ED setting. And some we've referred to these programs as “little d.”
So “Big D” disruptive would be a student who meets one of the seven criteria and go through all the appropriate steps of placement up to and including an informal hearing, to become an AEDY (Big D) student. And at-risk for a transition classroom, a “Little d” student. This is a student who is not meeting the big definition, the seven reasons for placement. So maybe he is engaged in some behaviors that looks like they are on a pathway to placement in an AEDY program. We've seen districts use these transition or at-risk classrooms in both ways.
So it could be a step before placement, and hopefully, in the “little d” classroom, the additional support and interventions will help so that the student doesn't become an AEDY student. Or we've also seen them being utilized as that step back before full transition to the regular ED setting. What you have to remember about these at-risk classrooms is that it has to be voluntary. So if you say to the parents, Johnny has been engaging in a bunch of behaviors, and if we don't see the straight and back out, we're probably looking at placement in an AEDY program if he continues on this track. So we would like him to attend our at-risk classroom and if mom says yes everything's good to go. But if mom says no way, then you cannot force place Johnny into that classroom. It is voluntary. On the flip side if Johnny's in the classroom and mom says, you know, I think Johnny's doing a whole lot better, I want him out of there. You must transfer Johnny out of there. It must be voluntary. And keep in mind that in this little D or transition or at-risk classrooms, all elements of chapter four must be provided. We know that in AEDY programs we only have to do English, math, social studies, science, and health or life skills. So we get a pass on the rest of chapter four. But in transition or at-risk classrooms, all elements of chapter four must be provided. So if Johnny is taking French two and music appreciation one and a whole bunch of electives, he has to receive those same courses in the little D classroom. I think that's the main points of that. So why don't we open it up for individual questions or scenarios? If you have a question go ahead and type it into the chat box and we will respond as questions come in.