Student Services Leadership Team Minutes
February 4, 2015
Present: Kim Silsby, Donna Madore, Deborah Towle, Beth Newman, Laura Hamilton, Helen Renko, Betsy Harwood, Theresa Violette, Missing: Sue Campbell and Rebecca Patkus
The meeting began with Kim welcoming new members Deborah Towle and Theresa Violette to the Student Services Leadership Team. Kim stated that Sue Campbell will remain on the committee as a community representative for now.
After the welcoming, Kim reviewed the data from the survey regarding the Social Worker position. The team talked about the scope of practice for Guidance Counselors, School Nurses, Social Workers and Therapists. Helen stated that Guidance Counselor have post secondary planning, course planning, and social emotional support in their scope of practice. She reminded the team that Guidance Counselor are not trained or equipped to do ongoing therapy to students. Beth Newman from KBH stated that she has a caseload of 20-25. Betsy talked about the scope of practice for the nurses. The team discussed that there is an unmet need for our students regarding a social worker in grades 7-12.
Helen reminded the team that there were two positions at Cony that worked in the Social Worker realm. The positions were cut due to budgetary concerns. Kim talked about creating an abstract or position paper regarding the need for a Social Worker position. She will create a draft and share it with the group.
Kim also shared that there was an extensive team action plan that was created when the Student Services Leadership Team was formed. Many new team players did not have a copy. Kim will send a copy to all the team.
Theresa Violette shared that there may be some grant money available to share the cost of a Social Worker. There is money available from time to time through the homeless youth program at DOE. Theresa had no idea when the grant would be available or how much would be available. The group decided to move forward in asking the School Board to consider adding a Social Worker position to the budget for 2015-16 because of the insecurity of a possible grant opportunity. Theresa also shared that she has had an increase in the number of students who are homeless in Augusta. She reported that 3 years ago the number was 42 students. Last year the number was 82 students. This year the number of homeless students is at 65 already.
The conversation next went to the topic of Family Planning. At the last meeting, Betsy reported that she didn’t have condoms from Family Planning. She reported that she called Family Planning and they said that they were not going to provide the condoms for Cony. Donna Madore reviewed the Memorandum of Understanding. The group discussed how each member was under the impression that Family Planning would be supplying the condoms. Kim said that she would follow up with Evelyn Kieltyka regarding the supply of condoms. Kim reminded the group that the focus groups had supported the availability of condoms with parental approval and Family Planning’s involvement.
Kim reported that students were taking the Youth survey on Feb. 4th to gather data about at-risk student behavior.
The next meeting is March 4th at 7-8am at Cony.
Kim, Helen, and Betsy are going to put together an abstract on the need for a Social Worker.
Kim is going to call Family Planning.
Respectfully Submitted,
Kim Silsby