Understanding the Student, Home, and Community Factors
that Impact Challenging Students
Dear Colleagues,
“The
ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and
convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy.”
Martin Luther King, Jr.
Introduction
Hang on,
folks. Today’s message is probably going
to wander a bit, but I promise that it will (hopefully) make sense by the end.
. .
When I was, for
thirteen years, the Director of the U.S. Department of Education-funded State
Personnel Development Grant (SPDG) for the Arkansas Department of Education, I
would often tell my staff (courtesy of John Wooden):
“Never mistake activity with achievement.
Activity doesn’t count unless outcomes result.”
What I was trying
to communicate was that I was less concerned about the number of phone calls,
meetings, on-site school consultations, and student recommendations that they
made each week, and more focused on whether those activities actually
impacted students’ academic and social, emotional, behavioral (short-term)
skills, mastery, and application outcomes, and (long-term) proficiency
and independence outcomes.
And while student
outcomes clearly were “Job 1,” I also knew that we needed to similarly look at
and facilitate how staff and schools were learning, mastering, and
becoming more independently proficient in:
* Organizational
development—including resource mapping and development, capacity-building
and sustainability, and systems-level support to schools, staff, and students
* Effective
school and schooling—including the use of scientifically- or research-based
practices at the administrative, curriculum and instruction, progress
monitoring and evaluation, and multi-tiered (i.e., prevention, strategic
intervention, and intensive need) service and support levels
* Professional
development and staff evaluation—including supervision and mentoring, and
teacher/educator effectiveness, accountability, and evaluation
* Multi-tiered academic
instruction, assessment, and intervention— including positive academic
supports and services
* Multi-tiered
positive behavioral support systems—including attention to school safety,
school and classroom climate, effective classroom management, and student
health, mental health, and wellness
* Multi-tiered
systems of support—including problem-solving teams, consultation processes,
and data-based functional and diagnostic assessments leading to effective
instructional modifications and/or academic/behavioral interventions
* Parent and
community outreach and involvement—including needs assessments, training,
support, capacity-building, advocacy, and the braiding of school and community
services and supports
* Data
management, evaluation, and accountability—including the formative and
summative tracking of system, school, staff, and student outcomes
[Click to see PART
I and PART
II of my recent series on Why Strategic Planning Must be Done by Every
School, Every Year]
_ _ _ _ _
The point here
is that: Students’ school-specific
outcomes largely occur because of effective, multi-tiered school and schooling
practices.
At the same time,
the Elementary and Secondary Education/Every Student Succeeds Act
(ESEA/ESSA) accountability goals of the U.S. Department of Education and our
state departments of education do not factor in the individual and
collective impact of:
* Student
Factors (e.g., their history, ecological status, potential, actual ability,
and motivation to learn)
* Home Factors
(e.g., the impact—on students’ school readiness and performance—of parental
education, income, presence, parenting, stability, and support)
* Community Factors (e.g., the
availability of well-paying jobs and appropriately-funded schools, health and
mental health personnel and resources, social and related service agencies,
after-school and youth-support programs)
_ _ _ _ _
And there are some students who are not
going to succeed in school—the way we all want—because of these factors.
Sadly, framed by ESEA/ESSA, the U.S.
Department of Education and our state departments of education do not want to
formally acknowledge this in their assessments of districts and schools.
That is, regardless
of individual student conditions, these organizations still focus predominantly
on “macro-analyses” of school, grade-level, and/or group or “sub-population”
data. And, these analyses are not sensitive
to, and the education departments do not factor in (e.g., through covariant
analyses) the challenging student, home, and community factors that sometimes negatively
impact these data.
I have personally
seen this short-sightedness.
Because my Department
of Education work occurred largely on-site and in long-term professional
development and consultation relationships with individual schools and
districts across Arkansas (and our country), I was intimately aware of how
Student, Home, and Community factors undermined student performance. Moreover, most of these factors could not be
reasonably influenced within the school.
In fact, I can
remember the “horror” of the State’s Director of School Improvement when I
returned from a multi-day consultation with one of our “lowest performing” ESEA
schools, and I said:
“Leave them
alone. They are doing the right things
given the conditions they are facing. If
they did anything more or different, it would completely screw up their
progress.”
My point was that
the additional progress that we wanted for the students in this school was
NOT going to occur through additional educational intervention. Instead, it was going to occur through
collaborative community, home, and student partnerships.
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
Trauma,
Transitions, and Teaching
“Problems are not stop signs, they are guidelines.”
Robert H.
Schuller
One of the great
things about consulting around the country (and world) is that, in different
districts or schools (or countries), I get to do a wide range of different
things. This is what makes my “job” fun,
and I get to learn new things all the time.
In some districts
and schools, I am helping at the organizational (including community) and
systems level. In other districts and
schools, I am assisting to address the intensive needs of individual students (and
parents) . . . And everything in
between.
Indeed, here is a continuum
of what I do from system to school to staff to student to home and to community:
* ESEA/ESSA
Strategic Planning and Preparation
* School
Improvement or School Turn-Around Planning and Execution
* Leadership,
Teaming, and PLCs
* Staff Evaluation,
Supervision, and Coaching
* Differentiated
Academic Instruction and Academic Interventions for Struggling Students
* Multi-tiered
(RtI/MTSS) Services, Supports, and Program
* School
Discipline, Classroom Management, and Student Self-Management (SEL/PBSS)
* Disproportionality
Relative to Office Discipline Referrals or Suspensions/Expulsions of Students
from Minority Backgrounds or Students with Disabilities
* Social,
Emotional, and Behavioral Interventions for Challenging Students
* Formative and
Summative Evaluations, Data Management Systems, and ESEA/IDEA Reporting
_ _ _ _ _
This past week, I
was consulting at an elementary school where I have worked for the past four
years—helping them develop interventions for a number of very challenging
students. This very rural school has
fewer than 500 students and is in a small district that has access to some
community-based and regional resource center services. Critically, these services and supports are not
enough given the intensity of student need.
As with any school,
many of the students are doing exceptionally well—given the conditions. But from an academic and social, emotional,
and behavioral perspective, the most needy students are exceptionally needy.
Here are but three
of the students that I worked with this past week:
Jaynie. Jaynie came from another district to this
school after a year in kindergarten—where she was identified as a student with
a learning disability. While she
completed her kindergarten year and entered “our” school as a First grader, her
academic skills were so low and she was demonstrating such high levels of
work-related emotionality that her mother agreed with the school’s
recommendation to return Jaynie to kindergarten in October.
Just prior to that
meeting, a Cumulative Record Review revealed that, during kindergarten in her
previous school, Jaynie had had three different teachers (one of them a
long-term substitute). And while there
were no attendance issues and her report card grades were low in most academic
areas, it did not appear that she was considered for retention—even though she
was young for grade.
At home, Jaynie is
being raised by her now-single mother who has some documented mental health
issues herself. Community mental health
supports are limited at best.
Just this week,
Jaynie was screaming in the classroom, refusing to do her work, and threatening
peers—all requiring one-on-one support and supervision.
_ _ _ _ _
Aaron. We have been working with Aaron, now
9-years-old and in Third Grade, since First Grade. Across this timespan, Aaron has demonstrated
a significant range of social, emotional, and behavioral problems that have
required office discipline referrals, school suspensions, the need for him to
spend time in our “Opportunity Room” with one-on-one supervision (including
parental supervision), and one-on-one instruction with a special education
teacher.
In the classroom,
Aaron will (a) make noises (routinely getting louder when asked to stop), (b) demonstrate
inappropriate behavior immediately after teachers have asked other students to
stop the same behavior, (c) refuse to follow directions, (d) make numerous
negative self-statements, (e) be aggressive with both peers and staff, and (f) engage
in manipulation, testing the behavioral limits, inappropriate “negotiations” to
get out of expected work or behavior, and other antisocial interactions.
During Second
Grade, Aaron attended another school district, but his behavior was so bad that
his parents home-schooled him (instead of a suspension) during the second half
of the year.
In Third Grade, his
inappropriate behavior (including a number of staff assaults) escalated such
that the principal referred him into the Court system. Part of this arrangement included
transporting Aaron to the Court’s “Quiet Room” instead of suspending him. Numerous supervised stays there have not
change his behavior. In fact, Aaron
recently assaulted another school staff member, and has now been suspended from
school by the Court.
A Court-ordered
psychological assessment, confirming previous school assessments, diagnosed
Aaron as Oppositional Defiant with Attention Deficit Disorder, and Anxiety
Disorder (Not Otherwise Specified).
Intellectual and achievement testing could not be completed because
Aaron refused. And new information was
uncovered that Aaron was hospitalized after his brother hit him in the head
with a baseball bat at age 2 and a half.
Aaron’s parents
deny that he has any behavioral problems at home, and yet, the Court-ordered
psychological assessments they completed contradict this. The regional resource center does not have a
program for Aaron (and believes he is “socially maladjusted).” The Court cannot place Aaron into a juvenile
residential program until he is at least 10-years-old.
All of the
educational partners acknowledge that the Court suspension and off-site special
education services to-be-delivered will not provide Aaron with the intensive
cognitive-behavioral therapy and classroom interventions that he needs (these
school-based therapeutic services are unavailable). Moreover, the partners are willing to place
Aaron into a therapeutic residential program (my strong recommendation), but
are deferring to the Court’s “placement.”
Finally, my ongoing calls for a comprehensive neurological assessment
have not been addressed.
_ _ _ _ _
Betsy. Betsy is a Fifth Grader who we have been
working with for over two years. Betsy’s
most problematic behaviors include: (a) “shutting down” during class, and putting
her head on her desk; (b) periodically lashing out at peers when she is
frustrated; (c) getting emotional—particularly
when she doesn’t get her own way; and (d) not getting her
work assignments completed.
Betsy was socially
isolated relative to her peers, she would often read books of her own
choice—rather than completing assigned work, and she made frequent trips to the
Nurse.
Betsy entered the
school in the middle of Third Grade as part of a court order where she was
removed from her mother and step-father’s home and relocated to her biological father’s
home. The removal occurred because of
the presence of drugs in her mother’s home, Betsy’s observation of domestic
violence and sex acts that including whipping (Betsy called 911), and the
resulting direct physical abuse that Betsy experienced.
Betsy’s biological
mother had a history of bipolar mental health issues, and Child Protective
Services and Family Court was involved in her case.
Given the history
of trauma evident in Betsy’s past and the social, emotional, and behavioral
concerns, individual therapy with a psychologist skilled in trauma and
cognitive-behavioral therapy was recommended.
While she was receiving counseling from the school counselor and a
regional resource center social worker, neither of these professionals had the
skill or time to meet Betsy’s intensive needs.
_ _ _ _ _
Student Analysis and Implications
Jaynie, Aaron, and
Betsy—each for somewhat different reasons—are not coming to school each day
“ready for Primetime.” Their classroom
engagement (if they actually get to the classroom) varies from day-to-day. Their teacher and peer interactions range
from neutral to nonexistent to negative.
Their “response-to-educational-intervention” is slow, limited,
inconsistent, or rejected.
They each have
significant academic deficits, and they are not learning.
They all will take
the state proficiency tests at the end of the school year, and each of them
will fail.
And if there are
more Jaynies, Aarons, and Betsy’s in the school (and there are many), many
grade-levels will “fail” on the state proficiency test, and the school will
find itself in ESEA improvement status.
This is not to excuse the non-proficient
status of the school, but to understand it.
But it also is to understand (as above)
that education-only interventions will not solely increase the academic
proficiency of this school, its grade-levels, or its individual students.
And it is also to recognize that many
schools, districts, and communities have resource and expertise gaps and limitations
relative to addressing the immediate and comprehensive needs of these students.
_ _ _ _ _
Intervention that Impacts Trauma
Education has just
recently gotten into the “trauma business.”
And while districts and schools are recognizing the impact and
educational implications of trauma, as a neophyte in the process, they do not
fully understand it from a neuropsychological and—especially—multi-tiered
psychoeducational intervention perspective.
Moreover, in their
desire to help these students, to increase their success in the classroom, and to
enhance their staff’s confidence and ability to teach, many districts and
schools have accepted, purchased, or implemented trauma programs
“off-the-rack.”
And yet, many of
these programs:
* Have not been
extensively field-tested and empirically-validated in a range of districts with
a range of students with different traumas
* Are not based on
relevant and meaningful neuropsychological and psychoeducational
science-to-practice principles and practices
* Are or are seen
as “yet another program” that staff need to do in addition to this program, and
that program, and this additional program, etc.
_ _ _ _ _
You see, trauma has
become a big business in education, and the entrepreneurial players see
districts and schools as “a market” for their (not-yet-validated) perspectives
and programs, while the well-meaning “do-gooders” naively believe that they
hold the key to solving the problem.
The Bottom Line
is: Student trauma is unique to each
student. Thus, the students and
situations require diagnostic assessments that are then linked to strategic
and/or intensive clinical, school, and home interventions.
These analyses and
interventions then can be organized into those delivered to (a) individual
students, (b) groups of students (based on common needs), (c) grade-levels of
students (given the developmental differences across some grade-levels), and
(d) all of the students in a school.
While described
from the “inside-out,” the continuum above reflects the multi-tiered nature of
most intervention systems.
But it is critical to note (as above) that
the neuropsychological science underlying multi-tiered interventions for trauma
involves the same science as multi-tiered approaches to school
discipline, classroom management, student self-management, emotional
self-regulation, teasing, bullying, and physical aggression.
[CLICK
HERE for recent Blog:
“Effective School-wide Discipline Approaches: Avoiding
Educational Bandwagons that Promise the Moon, Frustrate Staff, and Potentially
Harm Students. . . Implementation Science and Systematic Practice versus
Pseudoscience, Menu-Driven Frameworks, and “Convenience Store” Implementation”]
To summarize
again: We must understand that some
student’s “academic difficulties” intersect with their social, emotional, and
behavioral difficulties. And these
difficulties must be understood and addressed by looking at the student, home,
and community factors that are underlying the difficulties.
Moreover, it is
inappropriate to evaluate, down-grade, and—in essence— blame our schools for
social, emotional, and behavioral issues that directly impact students’
academic outcomes.
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
A Personal (and
Professional) Note
“In order to succeed, we must first believe that we can.”
Nikos Kazantzakis
While I began the
section above by talking about how “fun” my consulting job is, my involvement
in cases like those of Jaynie, Aaron, and Betsy is frustrating, heartbreaking,
depressing, and paralyzing at times.
It’s frustrating
because of the limited resources in many geographic areas across the country,
but also because:
* These areas are
not funding and/or allowing their professionals to get the strategic and
intensive clinical training that they need;
* The schools, districts,
regional resource centers, and community professionals are not collaborating on
an ongoing, consistent, and effective basis; and
* There are political,
policy, procedure, and practice differences that establish engagement and
enactment barriers that interfere with the school, regional resource center,
and community-based collaboration.
_ _ _ _ _
It’s heartbreaking
because of what these children have experienced, are experiencing, and will
likely experience in the future.
It’s depressing
because the prognosis for these children is so bleak and their needs are so
great.
And, it’s paralyzing
because you sometimes don’t know where to start, what to do, and whether you
can overcome the system gaps, the staff limitations, and the students’
(sometimes) day-to-day crises.
_ _ _ _ _
Given all of this,
it would be easy to disengage, move into a protective mode, and/or lower your
expectations. And there are times that
I, too, throw up my hands in despair and disbelief. But at some point, my sense of right,
advocacy, persistence, and belief that change will occur returns. . . and we
start “working the problem” again.
Most educators are
“wired” this same way. That is, when
confronted with seemingly insurmountable situations, they kick it into gear and
take on the challenge. They believe. They work the problem. They facilitate change.
And while this is
all honorable and remarkable, we need to take care of these professionals. More specifically, we need to make sure that
our educational “first responders” get the support and care that they
need. . . so that they can continue to give our most challenging students the
services, supports, interventions, and the hope that they need. . . at full
strength.
Yes. . . one of the social-emotional supports that Jaynie,
Aaron, and Betsy need is hope. Even when they
have given up, we need to raise them up by telling them, showing them,
and proving to them that they can succeed.
Sometimes, we need to be their hope . . . until they can bring their own
hope to the table.
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
Summary
Thomas Edison said,
“Many of life’s failures are people who did not realize how close they were to
success when they gave up.”
_ _ _ _ _
I have yet to work
with a school, across this vast country, that does not have a group of students
who walk into school every day with significant and disruptive challenges that
are not of the school’s making.
We need to
understand the student, home, and community factors that underlie their
challenges, and recognize that—ESEA or not—we must help these students to move
past, resolve, cope with, or compensate for these factors.
This takes the
right resources, applied in the right ways, implemented in the right places,
with the right levels of intensity.
But it also takes
hope, belief, and a realistic level of optimism.
It is not easy, but
it is necessary. We must “work the problem”
rather than “blame the victim.”
_ _ _ _ _
“It always seems
impossible until it’s done.”
Nelson
Mandela
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
I hope that this
message has touched you in some way. The
work that you do is important, and you are being successful—even if it
does not always seem that way.
How many of us have
had students return to visit us. . . years after they left or finished school? These are the students that we never felt we
“reached”. . . that we never felt successful with. And yet, they are at our door to thank us for
what we did for them, and how we significantly impacted their lives.
Multiply the one or
two students who return by one or two hundred (or more). Because those one or two students represent
the hundreds of frustrating and challenging students that most of you have positively impacted. . . you
just may not know it.
_ _ _ _ _
If I can help you to
impact more of your students, I am always available by e-mail or phone. Let me hear from you. Let me know how I can help you, your
colleagues, your school, or your agency/organization go to the next level of
excellence and impact.
Best,
Howie
