Briefly let you know some of the things that we're going to
be talking about um when I'm done, you will be greeted by
our executive director, Ms. Diane Eagan, and we're very happy
that she's on with us tonight along with some of our of our other uh
district administrators. But we will
have um a presentation from Ms.
Jackie Luscombe, who is our
ESC council. Um, followed by
our curriculum supervisor for curriculum, Ms.
Sabrina Shi will be talking to you a little bit about some of
those, um, first week of school
expectations. Um, many of you, um, know that it can be
anxiety ridden sometimes, so Sabrina is going to allay some of your
fears. Um, our due process office will talk to you
about how to connect with support that will be provided by
Ms. Oprah Bennett, one of our due process coordinators, and
then we'll move in some other, into other topics, um.
We will present information on transportation and that will
be delivered by Ms. Ashley Galloway, one of our ESE program
specialists, um, then we will talk about before
and after school care and also an
IDEA update which will be provided by Ms. Andrea C
Ati, who is our director for
specialized instruction. As we move
through the evening, then we will talk about private instructional
personnel, and that will be delivered by Ms. Kelly Fisher, who is
our assistant director. Um,
Pod, we will also be getting, you will be getting information on the audio
visual recording of self-contained ESE
classrooms, which is addressed in policy
4900. Again, Ms. Shive, our curriculum
director, will provide that information to you and you know
we, um, slash your head a new student information system
we call it focus and so. We will welcome Ms.
Dana Rubenstein, assistant director from that department, to share
an update with you on focus and to.
our evening together, we know parents that practical tips are
exactly what you want to hear so that you can start your year strong.
So I will welcome Ms. Lauren Dieterson, one of our ESC program
specialists, to just share with you some of those practical things that you can
do to prepare. Your students, your children, for an
exciting and productive school year. So
having said that, it seems like a lot. But this is
an informational session. We really wanted to just
jump start by giving you some updates on things you might want to know. We know that
you will find it valuable. So having said that,
I'm gonna move right into introducing Ms. Diane
Egan, our executive director for exceptional
student education. Welcome, Diane.
Hi everyone, so great that we have so many people
here tonight. Thank you for joining us. I see a couple of questions in the chat,
so I'm just gonna address it for everyone, but tonight we have
a. General, um, information
session for the school district. If you want to know about specific
activities regarding the beginning of the year at your school, please check
their school website or you can call their school and ask, or they may be sending
that information out directly to you. So I just wanted to let you know we
wanted to. Give you kind of a general heads heads up for things
that we need to know for starting school. We know this is such an important
time of the year. We just had a wonderful summer summer. I hope you
had time to take, take time to do the things you love with the people you
love. Um, it's time to hit the ground running for school. We already
have lots of preparations going on across Broward County, and
we have a lot of preparations going on at the individual schools. Our
teachers haven't returned yet, but they'll return on Monday, and you know they'll
have so much to do to get ready to welcome your children. So I just wanted
to let you know this is purely an informational session. We will
answer some general questions in the chat. But if you
need specific help, um, first reach out to your school if they can answer your
question. If not, if you want to reach out to the ESC office, we'll have
our QR code in there where you can reach out to our office. We're always here to
help and help you navigate any challenges you might have. So
with no further ado, I'm gonna turn it over to Jackie Luscombe. She's our
ESC advisory chairperson.
Oh. Good evening, everybody. Thank
you, Diane. Thank you, Gwen, um, and happy nearly
New Year, everybody. I see great numbers of, um, over 500
people. I think I'm here already, so that's wonderful. Um, I'm Jackie
Luscombe, I'm the chair of ESC Advisory Council.
I'm not a member of staff of BCPS. I am a parent. We are a
parent led parent. Driven
volunteer body, um, and we're established by the school board to kind of be a
voice for you folks, to be a voice for the ESC community,
um. And work in the best interests of students with
exceptionalities. So um I'm here to just take a couple of
minutes to tell you a little about what we do and
how you can be part of us, because people ask ESC advisory,
and it's actually all of you. If you come to a meeting,
you get to be part of of uh. taking part in discussions,
making suggestions, bringing information or learning information,
bringing ideas. Um, we're not a kind of personal clinic
for troubleshooting your personal issues at a meeting, but we do have some
general assistant always there too, and we're always here
to support you. We have a Facebook page if you're.
all like me and still on Facebook, we have a very active
page with 9000 people on it, and it really is a great forum for
support and information and advice. I have a different name
on there. My name is Jackie Goddard on there, and I will always step in and help if there's
some, if I see somebody not on there, um, getting
help or or Actually needing some support in some way. We
actually bring um feedback and recommendations to the superintendent.
Dependent and school board. That's a kind of role. Under policy
so we For ideas that we think are going to this.
With improvement of ESC in Broward schools, uh,
the team here do a wonderful job supporting all your kids, um, and I want
to thank them so much. For the work they do. Um, Evi meets on the
3rd Wednesday of every month, except for August. So rather than
deluge, thank you for my slide. Thank you. Um, so rather than deluge
you with a bunch of dates now, do look out in your inbox, which should be around the
first week of school. We will get our calendar out to you, and
there's information on here, um, that I hope. We can all just take a
screenshot of or if it can be posted in the chat, which gives
you information on how, how and where to find us. And I do just want
to say one more thing. Never think that speaking up
won't get you anywhere. I I know from my own experience, you
know, it can be frustrating you, if you have an issue or a problem or a concern.
But we do recognize too that there is so much good that goes on in Broward schools
and where we can make constructive suggestions. and improvements
or things that are going to broaden the um the depth and breadth and um and
and standard of services for students with disabilities, we will do that.
And in fact, policy 4900, which you're going to hear about later on this evening
from staff, is an example of exactly why you need to
support your Broward ESC advisory council. We suggested um.
This policy, it allows for a camera to record proceedings in
an ESC self-contained classroom. You'll be told what that is
later on. But it's just an extra layer of safety for
students in those classrooms who don't have a voice to speak for themselves.
It's an added protection. For everybody in that room
and support, um, and we hope you will all sign.
Yes, on your consents. More about that later. I just wanted to say
welcome and who we are and us and join us at our meetings. Thank
you very much.
Thank you, Jackie. And so now I'm going to introduce Ms Sabrina
Schei, our director for curriculum. Good afternoon,
Sabrina. Hi. Good evening, everyone.
And welcome to the open house. Um, I'm excited to share some
first week of school expectations just to kind of help you as
you transition. Um, although I'm the ESC director, I
see myself primarily as a parent, and I'm also a parent of a
child, um, with autism. So these are some things that
I also found helpful, and I hope you find them helpful as you navigate
that really important first week of school. So I think
First and foremost, looking at the slide too, um, sometimes, you know,
we know our teacher really well, but I wanted to make sure looking at this list that
everybody knew that there were different people at the school that can
assist you and their function. Obviously, your teacher is going to be
that person that's there every day that gets to really know
your child very well and the instructional assistants that are also in
the classroom. Um, your principal and assistant principal, though, are also
very important to get to know. Sometimes if you're a middle school
parent, You might have an assistant principal that's specifically
assigned to ESC students, and that's their primary
role and their assistant principal role in an elementary school there's
usually 1, sometimes 2 assistant principals, and
they probably the one or two probably all are
are gonna be helpful in being able to answer any questions
you. Have regarding your child. So it's always, of course, best
to start with your teacher because they're the most direct contact, so they
should be able to give you the best information. But if you feel like you need something
else, please always feel free to reach out to your assistant
principal or your principal. We also have guidance counselors on
our campus, and sometimes they call them school counsel. Counselors, guidance
counselors, these are gonna be people on your campus who will be
able to assist you with questions regarding your child's schedule,
regarding if you need some assistance with just maybe having them check in with your
child. So they are there to help your child. The
ESE specialist is really especially for some of our new
parents who maybe are just starting pre-K or kindergarten. Your
ESC specialist is the person who is going to coordinate your
individualized educational plan, coordinate. Your
services. So if you have questions about your IEP
or uh need to touch base about accommodations or
questions regarding that, that's gonna be a, a really key person.
And I put ESC support personnel on there too, because
you, your child may have many other teachers who
are part of. ESE I like to call portfolio, so
you might have an occupational therapist or a speech and language
pathologist, a support facilitator. These are all people
that you wanna get to know, get to know their names, so that if you have
questions pertaining to those services, you're able to
reach out and they can assist you.
What you can expect from the classroom the first week of school,
teachers are going to greet your child and then really start to get to
know your child. They're going to start to establish
those clear classroom routines, and especially when we're
looking at our Special programs like our autism clusters,
or IND programs, our EBD programs, those
classroom routines and structures are gonna be very important
because they're gonna help your child start to feel comfortable with their daily
schedule. And I can just give you a little aside here as a
parent. I always used to say sometimes for my own personal child,
it would take probably about 3 weeks before they
themselves felt comfortable. So my own child sometimes would be crying or
upset, but I always knew that with experience, I started
to learn that after getting into that routine for a few weeks, they
start to feel comfortable. It's really hard when we have to
do something new and a new structure, so. You know, give
your child that grace to be able to um have
some time to get to learn their routine, and it's OK if it takes some
children longer, uh, to feel comfortable with that day to day
of going to school. It's a huge transition coming off
a summer going into now this classroom community.
Teachers are gonna be building classroom community through
activities so that the classrooms children can get to know each
other and their teacher. And something else I thought was important for you
to know is they could also begin some of those what we call
informal assessments for academic baselines.
So there might be a lot of assessments in the first few weeks of school
as the teachers are trying to get an idea of where your child is so that they can
ensure that they're targeting the appropriate instruction geared towards
the level of your child. Um, you want
to consider for your own children leading up to and during
the week, you may wanna consider creating an informational
document to introduce your child to the teacher. So if you're the
type that um maybe doesn't feel comfortable right away getting in for a
conference, or, you know, that meet and greet and open house can
sometimes be really quick and you really don't have the time.
To give a lot of information, sometimes a little informational document,
like getting to know my child is helpful, um, just to give them
some things maybe that your child likes, things that, um, maybe
your child doesn't like, like loud noises or they don't like to sit by the
door. So just as much information as you can to provide to introduce
your child, there are many templates that you can find
um online available for this. That
would help make a little quick, easy guide to introduce your your child, if
that's something you would like to do. School supply lists, I,
I always found as a parent, as a teacher. Um,
having those school supplies that first day or first week of school
really helps set your child up for success, because they don't,
they sometimes can feel nervous if they don't have the things that they need. So
if you don't have it already, check the school for the school supply list so
that they can have those items that they need to bring with them for the
first day of school. And the same thing with uniform policies,
different schools have different policies regarding uniforms, and
maybe your child would be like my child, she had a lot of sensory and
certain materials were difficult, certain shoes were difficult. So what
I what I tried to do and what I I'd advise you to do is, as you're
trying to comply with those um uniform requirements,
finding clothing that fit the unique needs of your child so that they're
comfortable in those uniform clothes that they're going to be wearing
to school. If your child is planning on taking the bus, and
I know there will be a presentation, please make sure that they, that you have the
transportation information and you're ready to go with that,
and plan on attending your child's open house. Sometimes it might be
called a meet and greet, but the open house where you will learn about
classroom routines and expectations, and you'll be able to clarify
any questions you have. And something that's like a little parent
tip, you know, anything that you're curious about, write it down so that you
don't forget to ask those questions when you go to open
house. Breakfast is a big one. I have two bullets there. For some
of your children, they're gonna want to eat breakfast at
school, and for others, they're gonna want to eat breakfast at
home. So either way, if you're going to have your child have breakfast
at school, find out what time. Is the
breakfast time because there's, you know, you really want your child to feel comfortable and relaxed
and have enough time to be able to participate in breakfast without
without feeling rushed and having to make that transition to the
classroom and if you're eating at home, just prepare to leave at a time.
Where they'll be able to enter class on time. It's just easier for children when they come
in at the start of the day with everybody else, so they don't feel like they have
to catch up with the routine of the day that everybody else has started
on. So that timeliness actually really just helps your child to be able
to transition well to the school day.
Help your child learn their schedule and classroom routines. So as you're noticing
that, um, and you go to Open house and you notice they have reading first and then
math, or maybe they're gonna have an assembly, you know, remind
them tomorrow in an assembly. So the more you can just remind
your child of the routine of the day, if you're a middle schooler
or a high schooler. That's on an AB schedule, reminding them,
OK, tomorrow's day B, tomorrow's day A. It never hurts
to repeat that, even if it's every day for the year, because
whatever is helpful in making your child feel good and
understand what's coming is going to make them feel as well.
And I think an important one is to teach your child if they're feeling
uncomfortable about something, if somebody's bothering them, saying
something to them, or they're just not feeling safe, they always
should report that to an adult immediately, a trusted adult
immediately so that, you know, that could be taken care of right away,
um, because the, the sooner people know that some things happen, the more
likely that we'll be able to get to the bottom of it and help your child
feel safe at school. Thank you.
Thank you so much, Sabrina. OK, so next up we're gonna keep going,
we're going to be talking about connecting with support. Alright,
so I introduce to you Miss Opel Benne, one of our due process coordinators.
Hello, Opal.
Oprah, are you there?
I forgot about that. No problem, and
your camera as well, there you go. Great, thank you. Good
evening. Good evening, everyone. My name is Opel Bennett,
and I am one of two due process coordinators for the Office of
Dispute Res Resolution and compliance Services for the
ESC department. And I'd like to share with you how you
can make connections with support.
So how can families of students with disabilities connect with
support? We recognize that as
parents, you may have questions or concerns and aren't sure
of where to go for answers. I'll point your attention to the
five ways that are listed on this slide that can be that this can be
accomplished, and some of these um
supports align with the descriptions just provided
by Ms. Shai. So, once you've identified an issue you
would like to address, your first point of contact is a classroom
teacher. You can schedule a parent-teacher conference
to have a face to face communication regarding the concern,
which is followed by a written summary of the conference.
School-based support should align with the concern being
presented. If the concern is, for example, your
child's class schedule or a non-EE
specific programs such as magnets or clubs.
The school-based support would be the school counsel. If you
have specific IP concerns such as IEP supports and
services or IEP meetings, your
school-based support is the ESC specialist. If you
have concerns regarding. Starting And as
discipline staff like prices, your school-based
support is the assistant principal or the principal, and
as Ms Shi shared earlier, middle schools and high schools
are usually have administrators specifically assigned to the
ESC department as a source of contact as well.
The third option here is the region office. The region
office is available to support further connections or
further concerns rather about school processes,
staff, or any school-based concerns that you may
have. When you are in need of ESC support,
we have a member of our staff, the ESC parent
liaison, and her contact numbers listed on that slide,
who will be able to collaborate with you and district ESC staff to
address your concerns. This. Position
is not known across the state and Broward County Public schools is pleased to
offer this level of support to our parents. In this
role, the parent liaison responds to local conflict
resolution requests, and I'll explain a little bit
further about that once we get to number 5. The
parent liaison collaborates with ESC specialists and the
administration to collaborates with the curriculum
supervisors to address ESC related concerns
such as concerns related to academics, the
provision of special education services, or
ESC complaints. The parent liaison facilitates.
Local conflict, meetings as a liaison between parents
and schools to assist in resolving conflicts prior to
formal complaints being filed. Parent liaison
attends parent engagement activities and ESC
advisory meetings. Parent liaison also
provides timely follow-ups to concerns. And
finally, if you have a conflict that you believe
impacts your participation in IEP meetings, for example,
a conflict could be about. Communication
with school staff, it could be about understanding the
ESC terminology or even
understanding the ESC process. You can request a local
conflict resolution to address the concern. The
local conflict resolution is an option available to parents of
students with disabilities to resolve conflict at the school
with support from district staff. This option
utilizes an IEP meeting to discuss and
resolve concerns. Participating in a local
conflict resolution is a positive first step towards resolving
an issue between the school and the parent
collaboratively.
Our parent is Mr. Stephanie Mules. Stephanie's
contact information is also listed on this slide, as well as a
QR code that opens up a communication form where you
can provide I'm sorry, provided. Information that
will assist her with addressing your. Sorry,
please take a moment and scan the QR code for access to this
link. It will also be available in the
chat. The communication form is also
located on the district's website as a resource on the
exceptional student education's home page.
Thank you for your time this evening.
Thank you so much, Opal, and thank you for dropping that QR code in the
chat because it's being asked for. So thank you so much.
You're welcome. OK. Next up, I'd like to introduce to you,
um, Ms. Ashley Galloway to give us an update on
transportation. Hi, Ashley.
Hi, good evening. My name is Ashley
Galloway. As mentioned, I am an ESC program specialist and I'm going to
give some updates regarding transportation.
Hey please.
OK, so we have some useful information here. We have different
policies, if you could go back one slide for me.
And Ashley feel you can take control if you like as well, but I'll go
back for you.
OK, it's not allowing me to go back.
Thank you. OK, go ahead. OK, so we have
our first policy, which is the alternate route policy, which is
300.2, and this is where a
student may need an alternate location for the morning
or for the afternoon bus stop, and it must be along
an existing route and is limited to students living
um 2 miles or more from the. Students assigned to
school. In addition, it is limited to increasing the route by no more
than 0.75 of a mile, or
increasing the students ride time by no more than 5
minutes. Another policy that we have is the empty
seat policy, which is policy
6600. This form will be available at
the at your child's school beginning September 2nd,
2025. And um it will
be completed at the school. In addition, we
have a sibling writer, so a parent or guardian of a student with
an IEP may request a seat through the sibling writer program
for the student sibling. This will be available on the first day
of school, which is August 1 11th,
2025, and the student with an IEP has to be routed
first. The sibling must also ride on the same seat and live in
the same house, attend the same school, and utilize the same
pickup and drop-off location. These are
All all courtesy ridership requests and has to be reviewed
annually. Approval is not guaranteed.
It's determined by the students' needs, travel distance seat
availability, and first come first served basis. If you have
any questions about these policies, please reach out to the
ESC specialist at your school.
OK. Based on your child's IEP, the
Invisualized education plan, they may require a harness.
This harness is given by the school on the first day
or by the bus driver if they do not already have one. The
harness. Must be placed on the child before they get on
the bus and should be kept at home
um throughout the school year until the child either ages out of the
program or no longer needs the vest. This safety vest is
the sole property of um the student transportation and
fleet services.
OK, so now we're gonna go into some back to school reminders,
um, beginning August 5th, 2025, you will be able
to confirm your child's bus stop location, the pickup and drop
off times, and the driver or a for the first
day of school, and if the information is not accurate, please
reach out to your school so it can be updated. You also want to
make sure that your information is updated.
Within focus, um, so that way we have all the. In
the child's bus. May arrive 10 minutes before or after
the scheduled time. Please have your child outside at the
bus stop with their safety vest on if they require a safety
vest. Drivers are on a set schedule and not
wait beyond a reasonable time frame. Please communicate
any changes with transportation and the ESC specialist
at your school.
OK, all of our students who have an IEP
and individualized education plan must be
um have a designated adult present at the stop during
pickup and drop off um to ensure safety.
If no adult is present, the student will be returned to the school
for safety reasons. This is a great opportunity
to review. The expectations while they are
riding a bus, such as staying seated using a quiet voice and
following the driver's instructions and if necessary
continue to practice this all throughout the school year.
OK. In addition, we have Here Comes the bus, which is an app
you may use this. QR code. I will also put it in the chat
as well. Um, this is so that way you're able to
see. Where the bus is for your student. I
personally use it for my child as well. It is not just for
ESE students, it's for all of our students, and you're able to see
um where the bus is. So again, it begins on
September 2nd, 2025, but you can download and
register and you will also need to have
Broward's ESC code, actually
is not the ESC code, sorry, it's the Broward school's code.
Just give me 1 2nd. Which
is 87599 again I will put that in the
chat as well um because you will need that.
Again, if you have any questions, you can reach out to the ESC
specialist at your school. And then next we
have some contact information if you have any trouble
with transportation, um, as far as the bus
riding, these are the different numbers. You also have the district office
and some of you may come in contact with me. I will be supporting
with transportation this school year. So we have the
north area, central, central west, south area and
southwest. So you can also take a picture of this information
as well if needed, but you can get the information
from Broward County School website or the ESC
specialist at your school. Thank you. Thank
you, Ashley. Um, our next presentation, the
next two presentations will be delivered by Ms. Andrea
Ziati, our director for specialized instructions. So
good afternoon, Andrea. Thank you, Gwen. Good evening
parents. um thank you for joining. Joining us, I'm gonna share with you a
few updates regarding before and after school
care, just so that you have that for anyone that may
need to explore the before and aftercare
um option that they may have children.
We'll get to those slides and just yeah
yeah good. Very good. Are you taking control, Andre? I am not. Nope. I know that somebody was. OK. Sorry,
don't know what's happened. Let me go back into it. One second. Someone
was taking control. I thought it was you. No.
I'll go back, no problem.
Give me one minute just to leave through right quick. We
can get to where you're supposed to be.
I think I can control. OK. OK.
1 2nd, we're coming down to you in 1 2nd. And
you can take it from there if you like. Here we can, yeah, like
now I have control, so I can do it. Sorry, parents, thanks for bearing with
us.
There we go. All right. Before and
aftercare, we did put the link here, so if you wanna grab a picture of
that, you'll also get these resources afterwards, but you can visit our
district website for before and after school care.
No. And when could you advance it it was turned
off again. The
other way. The childcare programs
are offered at most of our Broward County public schools, and
most of the programs are operated by a contracted provider
that's approved by the school board of Broward County to provide
programs on our school campuses. And to find out
who that um contracted vendor is, you would want to check direct.
With your school's website or the for the program that's offered on their
campus. Your programs also are providing um a
real supervised learning environment also
embedded with play, um, and it's a wide variety of activities,
and they also offer time for some homework after school.
The program ratios are typically for elementary 1 to.
20 students, 1 adult for every 20 students, and for the
secondary grade bands middle and high school, they offer a ratio of
typically 1 adult for every 25 students. So remember
this is a more um play environment, kind of
downtime, extracurricular type activity. Next slide.
All of our before and after school childcare, um, programs
do welcome our students with IEPs, the students with special needs.
All the providers are federally required to make reasonable
accommodations for our students. They provide basic
child care, and not all of the programs offered
provide that intensive or therapeutic. Service, however,
select programs across the district do have a more intensive
ratio and um opportunity for students to have a
more intensive needs. In most cases, IEPs
are not carried over in before and after school care,
um, but oftentimes, um, you know, those things are taken into
consideration if you. Require your child
requires a more intensive or therapeutic setting. Um, usually our
504 plans also do not carry over to before and after
care. You'd have to check with your school location on that as
well, and you'll definitely want to visit your school's website to
find out about those programs and their offerings at each location,
because they vary. Next slide.
All right, so we're gonna update you a bit on our
annual individuals with Disabilities Education Act
grant. Um, we are in, um, in the
timing where we are looking at our grant um application every
year, the preliminary amounts or the funds for IDA
are released to school districts, and then we are able to request those funds
from the state. Um, and apply for our grant. We are
actually in that process right now, um, that, that
process is underway and pending DOE approval for the
25, 26 school year, um, that's where we really focus
on our direct services for students with disabilities. We provide things like
our autism coaches from those funds. A pair of
professionals, our deaf and hard of hearing interpreter
services, our district support services,
technology devices and services, um, training and teaching our
students and teachers on how to use their devices, our
specialized supports, our occupational and physical therapy
equipment. And providing some speech and language therapy
services. So on this slide, you will see the preliminary
allocation for the 25, 26 school year for, um, the school
board of Broward County is a little over $62 million
in that IDA grant. Um, a portion of that
is held aside for what we call proportionate share
for our private school students, our parentally placed private school
students, and that's. At about $6 million we are set aside
to reserve for students with disabilities attending private schools,
which leaves our district's overall allocation at about
$56,543,000.
So, um, that is a little bit just about what we do every year
as we look at, um, planning for above and beyond and
meeting our students' needs and, um, helping us to continue that
academic achievement that we're really excited about this year.
Next slide.
OK, that's it. So next up is
Ms. Kelly Fisher, our assistant director, to speak to you
about private instructional personnel. Good evening, Kelly. How are you?
Good evening Gwen. Thanks for the introduction. I'm, I'm doing well and welcome parents
and families to our virtual open house. Also here to
share, um, a brief overview of our PIP process. Um,
PIP PIP is an acronym that stands for Private instructional personnel,
and that's the process in place for our families to request private.
Services for their child that will be will be provided in the
school setting. So under the statute, um,
that allows for the collaboration of public and private instructional personnel.
Um, and what that essentially means is that any private instructional
personnel who is hired by a parent must be allowed to observe
the student in the school setting, collaborate with instructional personnel
in the educational setting, and provide direct services,
or a combination of all three services. There are two
requirements that um need to be met in order. For those
services to initiate and start on campus, one of which
is that the students, uh, classroom teacher, and the
principal must consent to how often those
services take place during the school week and where those services
are delivered. So again, one of those requirements is that the principal and
the teacher both must mutually agree to the.
Time and place for those services to occur. The second requirement
is that the private provider must meet our security
clearance requirements in order to be able to access the
school campus and have direct contact with any of our students.
Next slide. Just to
clarify, uh, the purpose of this statute, it is really
meant to supplement and enhance the
services that um are being provided by
our team for the I. EP not in place of the services that we're
providing. So again, these services are meant to be supplementary to
the services that are that your student is already receiving through their
IEP, um, so just make sure that you
understand that just because you're deciding to utilize and access private
services, um, does not mean in any way, shape or form that you are
forfeiting or compromising your right to a free and appropriate education.
Um, schools are still responsible and legally bound to following
your child's IEP even during the times that they're accessing those
private services during the school day.
Next slide. Um, so the process, um, in order to
initiate a request that, uh, will ultimately be considered by
the school is we've got, um, we have a PIP packet actually that we
just released for the, for the upcoming school year. Um, it's
embedded right here in this slide which you'll have access to after
the um open house. It's also available
on our website as well. Um, you can find it there
and you'll have to complete and submit a complete packet to formally
request services for your child. And just a reminder that even if
you utilize the same provider last year that you'll be using again this
year, so for example, if the same RBT will be working with your child again
this year, you're still required to submit um a brand
new packet for the upcoming school year. So that process does restart
and reset every year annually, even if you are
using the same provider. And finally, just another
reminder that um. If you um if you have
a private RBT that is working under the supervision
of either a BCBA or a BCABA
each provider will will separately need to complete and submit their
own packet, OK? They're not required to submit one packet,
but each provider themselves is required to complete their own separate
packet in order to be processed and considered.
Next slide. We
do ask this year, um, the schools have a preference that
um if you are going to submit a packet that they be sent
electronically to the school's ESC specialist and that
person is really gonna serve that point of contact for receiving
those requests and starting to process and review those
decisions. um, so they, they do prefer that you email those
packets and instead of dropping them off in person at the school.
Sometimes the front office can be a little bit chaotic, especially at the start of the
new school year, so we would, we wouldn't want the packet to end up in the wrong hands of
the wrong person and then inadvertently stall or push that
process out. So in order for us to really expedite
um the decision, if you could just make sure that those packets are
submitted directly to the ESC specialist and that should help push
the process along as quickly as possible. Um, just so
you know, the schools as of today, they're currently accepting and
considering pit packets. Uh, we started this past Monday accepting those
packets, um, so schools are available to
take packets, um, if you've got them ready. Um, just so
you know that it may take up to 30 days before a final decision
is made. However, we will definitely do our best to expedite
those requests and make a decision in a in a timely manner,
and those decisions will be made in the order that the PIP packets are
received. Next slide.
This is just some information about our vendor badges that are required,
um, just a, a very important distinction is that the
um a badge issued just by the state of Florida alone is
not sufficient um to allow a vendor onto our
campus. They must have a vendor badge that is issued
directly from Broward County Public Schools. Showing that they've met
our level 2 clearance requirements, which is what will
ultimately allow them to access the campus and have direct interaction and
contact with our students on school grounds. So just, um, you know,
important distinction there that they have to have a Broward County issued vendor
badge um in addition to having a state badge.
And the badges are required for any provider whether they're new to
our to our school or they're returning to the same school or a different
school, uh, the process is the same for all providers um,
everyone needs to make sure that they that they're properly badged and credentialed in
order to start, start this year. um, and just another
reminder that um they're also responsible for knowing when
their badge and. Or their certification credentials are about to
expire and then making sure that they're responsible and updating and
renewing those credentials before they expire. In
the event that they do expire, uh, that individual will be asked
not to return to that campus until they can show that they
have an updated badge and certification. So this could
inadvertently again cause a lapse or a delay in service.
which could be detrimental to the students. So we really wanna try to avoid
that. So uh when you're communicating with your private providers
because we know you, you know, you have a very positive relationship with
um your private RBTs and your BCBAs, just
make sure that they're very mindful of this. This is something that we run into a lot
that could easily be avoided with, um, you know, good communication and
responsibility. And then finally, just a reminder that all
private vendors are required to be re-fingerprinted every 5 years just
to keep in good standing and maintain that security status.
These are just some tips for expediting the process.
Um, make sure that on page 10 of the pack that's
probably the most important page that's gonna guide you through the process of
completing and submitting. packet, it will list each of the items or
the components of the packet, um, and ensuring that
those items are completed and properly submitted. Um,
what happen, you know, what will happen is if something is missing,
the packet will be sent back to the parents or the uh provider, uh, to
be completed. So we don't want that to solve the process. So just make
sure that you're using page 10 to kind of guide you and making sure
all those components are checked off. Also make sure that
each form includes the required initials and signatures
from both the private provider as well as the parents, um,
that also sometimes. We'll solve the process if we're missing an initial or a
signature, so just something little, um, just to keep
in mind as you go through that process. And then finally, just to ensure that your
credentials, licenses, and vendor badges are up to date before
the school year begins, that'll also help move the process along quickly.
This is just some information on how decisions are made um by
the school on the number of hours that the uh um
providers are allowed to work with the student on campus.
Um, those decisions are based on the data
that we collect on the student's behavior that shows how that behavior
is impacting their access to education. Um, it is based on
the individual needs of the student. And the final decision is
ultimately approved by the school principal, OK?
Uh, we can take some things into consideration when making that decision,
uh, but that decision is not based solely on. A medical
professional, um, a medical opinion, the number of hours
covered by the parents insurance company or the
recommendation from the BCBA. Now, while we can consider those things,
um, you know, they're not the sole they're not the driving
reason behind the decision. Next
slide. And then once the request is approved, the school will
then set up a meeting, a pre-meeting between the team that includes the parent,
the private providers, and the school-based team, and the purpose of
that pre-meeting will be to determine a mutually agreed upon schedule of
services. Um, they'll also review how the
private behavior plan will be implemented in the school setting.
Um, and how the private team plans on working
collaboratively with our school-based team to support the students' behavioral needs in the
best way possible so that real that pre-meeting is really gonna help
facilitate that positive partnership, um, that we plan on
having with the private team. And then finally that the
purpose of that meeting will be to set and communicate clear expectations for the private
team while they're on campus. um, these would be the same expectations we
hold any of our employees to. Um, such as
policies for signing in and signing out, following safety and
security protocols, and anything else that might be specific to that school,
um, that the private team should be aware of prior to initiating
those services at that school. Next
slide. That is it for you, Kelly. Thank
you.
OK. Next up is Sabrina again, and she's gonna be talking to you
about the audiovisual recordings of self-contained ESC classrooms, which
is policy 4300. Hi Sabrina
again. Hi, glad to be back for some exciting
news on Uh, sort of a hot off the press
item, um, from this week. So we
did this week have our school board approve a
local policy called Policy 4900.
And for those of you who do not know, this is a policy that
provides a self-contained ESC classroom with
audiovisual recording once all parents of the class have
provided written consent. With this policy,
we become the only district in Florida with a policy of this
kind, so we're leading the way in this endeavor and
really excited to Uh, embark on
this, uh, exciting news. So this is some
information for you where the camera footage is going to be retained
for 30 days, and this policy will allow parents to review
footage of an alleged incident within 7 days of
receiving the request. The footage will be redacted, and
a time will be scheduled to meet with you to review the footage.
Footage viewed and we wanted to, it, it becomes a little confusing with the
wording. So footage footage viewed as dependent on an
alleged incident, not a confirmed incident. So in the
past, um, you might have, you know, somebody might have said, well, we
didn't. See this incident or um it wasn't, you know,
the way that maybe it was, was reported, but either way, you'll be able
to see so that you know exactly what happened in that moment
and um you'll be able to view that footage of the confirmed
incident. Which we'll get into a little more detail throughout the school
year as we describe it a little more, but it is a key point that I think
uh parents will be very happy about. There is something called the
Parents' Bill of Rights, and we just want to explain a little bit how that bill of
rights has impacted the camera policy for those of
you. I'm sorry, we weren't on the other
side. Just the one that says parents bill of rights.
So it's the, there we go, perfect, thank you. So the Parents' Bill of
Rights, so for anybody who is familiar with the pilot program,
That we had for 3 years. It worked a little differently than
than this policy, and one of those distinctions
has to do with the Parents' Bill of Rights. The Parent's Bill of Rights
requires that parents provide written consent for
audiovisual recording of self-contained ESC classrooms.
So parents will say yes, that they
are consenting to their child being recorded in the
classroom. We have gotten the form
on focus, so the parent consent form can be completed
and tracked in focus, so that once all parents have
completed that form and said yes, the camera will be
able to be, you know, installed and turned on. Of course,
a paper copy can be printed if necessary, if someone does not
have access to the form or access to technology.
Next slide. We are gonna be working
in collaboration with ESC advisory because we want to
make sure that we're having a really strong communication plan for
families, so we're starting to develop that communication plan
to share awareness of the policy 4900 and the
written consent required under the Parents' Bill of Rights Act. Because
we want to really help parents know where to access
that form and how to um place their
consent. Parent links with information about the
policy and information about how to access the
consent will be sent home beginning actually tomorrow,
Friday, August 1st. Next slide.
So again, it's going to be tomorrow, August 1st.
I know it's gonna be hard to see in this slide, but just to show you,
there, this is what it's going to look like. You will get this type of
information so that you know exactly where to go and focus to be
able to access this form and be able to provide your
your consent to have the video recording.
Thank you, Sabrina. So
next up, speaking of focus um I um introduced to you
Ms. Dana Rubenstein from who is the assistant director of
our informational systems division project management office.
Welcome, Dana. Good evening everyone. Thank you, Gwen
and Sabrina. You put a perfect, uh, easing into the focus
presentation because yes, I will show you where you can find that policy
4900 form. So Focus is the
district's student information system. It is
your one stop shop. It has your students IEPs,
EPs. You can find your child's schedule. Attendance,
you can check their grades. You can this is where the interim reports
and report cards will be. This is where everything related to our
students lives because it is the student information system. It
is 100% web-based, so you can access it
through a device as well as there is an app that
I can show you where you can find the directions to download the app. And
it is the most widely used reporting system in the
entire state. It is in 3/4 of all of the
Florida districts and in 5 out of the 10 largest school
districts in the country. So it's a very well known and
used student information system, and it has very much.
Modernized Broward schools years ago if you have students
that have been in the system for a while we had several different
systems we had Pinnacle, we had um virtual counselor,
we had lots of different ones and now everything is in one place which
hopefully as parents you will find easier to find your child's information.
So what we're going to go over quickly today is how you can find
the back to school forms, how you can find your child's bus
routes, find the, if there's any archived IEPs or
EPs, as well as any current IEPs and
EPs. I'll show you where you can find your child's schedule,
assignments, grades, all of those things, and where you can find the
resources to go back to to help you make your account.
Uh, if we go ahead to the next slide for a moment, I'm gonna show you
a visual of what it will look like, and then we're gonna go
into the parent portal so I can show you how it looks in real
time. But what you'll see on this screen is the navigation of the
layout of the home. Page and in this uh
screenshot you'll see that the the landing page has all of your
students' information right there, and the menu bar is on the left hand
side. So I'm gonna go ahead and share my screen for a moment
so that I can show you what this looks like. I am
in the training portal, so the data is scrambled, although
because students have not started school yet, there's really not much in here,
but I want to show you just how the layout is. So this is what the Focus
parent portal will be on the landing page. Your
navigation is here on the left hand side. And you
land on the portal so what you're going to see here will be
district and school announcements when school starts, you'll probably see
more here. If you have more than one child, you'll see all of
them here, including not only public school students, but if you
have students in charter schools, they will be here as well.
What you'll see, uh, once there's grades and whatnot, is that for
quarter one, like in that picture, you'll see that there, there will be
grades right here at a quick glance. As the school year
progresses, you can then go to quarter 2 and quarter 3 and so on.
And when interim reports and report cards are pushed out,
that would be in this reports tab here, which of course there's nothing in right
now, but there will be as the year goes on. On
the left hand side, this is where you can find what
you need. So notice in this example this person has 2
students. If I click this little carrot, it opens up
and this is where you find all of that information.
So starting with the forms here on forms
summary, when you click on this, this is where you're going to.
See all of those forms for the new school year right at the
top is policy 4900 consents. There's a
form to update emergency excuse me, contacts. There's
the back to school form and then the 1 to 1 device
issuance agreement. So as the parent, you would just click on this, you
would go through what you need to do and then submit when you're
done. In addition to the forms,
finding your child's bus route is very, very important.
So for that it would be under child information.
And this is where It's coming.
Over here on the left hand side, you'll find transportation on the
bottom. So once the bus routes have been
pushed out to focus, which I heard someone say is happening.
Next week, this is where you will see your, this is the morning
bus stop. You have your your timing, your bus numbers and whatnot,
the route number, and then you have your PM as well.
So again, you'll find your bus routes here. I'm on I'm sorry,
child info and then transportation. You'll
also find on this class info tab, I'm sorry, child
info tab, the ESC tab, and when you click on
ESC, this is where if you have any archived
IEPs or EPs, they'll be fine here and
archived is anything that rolled over from
Eplant. So those are in here as an
archived PDF that you can open and find right
here. This particular one has quite a bit, so you just scroll down
and you'll find anything archived. Now for new
IEPs at EP, so that would be anything put into focus
starting last school year. Because Focus launched in
August of 2024, that is in
a different spot, so we're going to click down here on student
services, and when this opens, you'll find
that there's some buttons up here. So ESC, you would
click this, and this would be if there was a current IEP,
it would be located here. Gifted when I click on that
tab, if there was a current EP, it would be located here
as well. So again, there's a difference between the archive because those
pulled in from Ed plan and then the new
ones are in student services. Something else that's
very important, I'm sure you're. Curious of your child's schedule,
schedules will be available to parents and students mid
next week. So when I click on class schedule, you'll see it's not
here yet, but it will be next week. I
believe it's on Wednesday, August 6th, so you can check back for
that. In addition, once grades have
started, you can click on this grades tab, and that will take
you to the grades for your child, and you can see
in this scramble data I have some information up top for
GPA and whatnot. GPA is calculated for students that
have taken high school credits. If your child is in
elementary or middle school without high school credits
because I know some middle school students take foreign language and some other
high school courses, uh, you won't see this up here, but again this is where
you would find grades once school begins and
assignments have started and whatnot. You'll also find on the
left hand menu attendance, and so this is where you can see
at a glance, again, there's nothing here at the moment, but there will be when
school starts, teachers take attendance every day so that you'll be
able to see, uh, your child's attendance at a glance.
And then to go to another student, you can just click that little
arrow. And you'll see the same thing for that one, and if you click
the arrow, it just returns back. So I'm gonna just
go to our Broward School's web page so I could show
you where to find. More detailed resources about
focus and how to create your parent portal accounts.
So right here on the landing page, you might have noticed that Broward Schools have
now upgraded the web page and you can find Focus in a few
different places. I think the easiest one is up here to
go to the back to school page and click that, which I will in a
You can also over here on the right hand side if you click on
parents, you can find it there as well. But for now I'm just going to
go to the back to school page which has lots of helpful
information. And then on the right hand side here is
Focus, the Student Information System. And if we click on
that, you'll see that this page.
Has a lot more information. Here is a direct link if you
want to download the app for an Android. We also have the
iPhone download here. There is uh how to log.
How to, where am I looking? Sorry, we have to log into the parent portal
here if you need to add another account for another student,
reset your password down here is to create the parent
portal account. In addition to that, we have a video that will
show you a bit about it, and what's most important is when you are
creating that account that you have your child's full name.
The same name that's on record with the school. So if your
child has a nickname or something that you call your
child, it needs to be the same name as what's on record, your
student's ID number, that's the 06 number, and your
student's date of birth, date of birth. You will
also need uh the email address that you've registered all of
your students with, and it needs to be the same email address for
all of your students. And if there are any staff members watching,
any Broward school staff members for your parent portal account
for Focus, you must use a personal email address.
Not your Broward schools because your Broward School's email will take you to your
class roster, not your actual child. So there's
more information here about how to do your account and create
it. There are videos that you can watch to create your account, how
to do the navigation. They're very, very helpful. We have
FAQs down here. Here what I just showed you about accessing
your child's IEP and EP. If you click this link, it's gonna have a
video that will show you more. And then I just want to hop over. I'm going
to scroll back to the top and show you some other resources.
So we have two other pages, one for parents and one for
students. On the parent page, this is
where if you scroll down just a bit, the
parent handbook, this is going to open up and
we'll go. With many, many slides with
screenshots, exactly what we went over, plus a lot
more cause there's limited time tonight. So here you can
see. I'll just quickly show you the table of contents,
lots of stuff, so please take advantage of that and come
back when you have time. There's also directions for how to do
your parent portal registration, the app, the
landing page. graduation requirements and you can see
a ton of things here uh that's very important. There's also
additional videos and the same information here about the app.
I also want to show you, we're going to go back to the top, the student
page. Because students need to know how to find their
grades and other things too. And now on the student page,
here's where they can find directions to find their interim report,
their schedule, their grades, their test history, and so on, and
then directions for how to do all of that stuff. So I hope that
you find this useful. We do push out everything
through the, uh, through focus now, so please.
Create your Focused parent portal accounts and very
important, if you're unable to find the answers that you need,
please email focuscommunications at
Browardschools.com. That is a dedicated
email for parents, and we have a team that checks it a
few times a day, although it does get swamped, so please
be patient with us, but we will get back to you. And with that, I'm
gonna stop sharing and pass it back to Glen. Thank you, everyone.
Dana, thank you so very much. I'm going to go back to
our presentation right quick because I believe Ms. Lauren
Dieterson is up next because parents, you are
being so wonderful, you're not gonna wanna miss the next
presentation on practical tips on
having a really strong year. So give me a second. Oh,
I took control. That's wonderful.
OK, so I'm gonna skip all the way to the end. I am so glad to be
with you. I'm Lauren Didrikson. I'm a program specialist for behavior,
and I know that was a lot of information. I'm a
parent too, so I know it's a lot of information, but it was a lot of
wonderful information. Actually, let me do it this way. I apologize.
Here we go. So how are you feeling right
now about the start of the school year? Which
sour patch matches your mood? You don't need to put it in the chat.
These are some fun things that we like to do with um In the
classroom on our professional learning activities, but it's
good to think about. There's a link at the bottom with a
very cool website that I share with teachers. It's called Ed Tomorrow,
but feel free to go on there too, because they have things like this,
and maybe you use something like this with your kids. Kids, um, at
the beginning of the day or when they come home to kind of judge how do they feel?
Sometimes kids don't want to talk. Maybe your, your child is nonverbal, and they can
kind of point to the different things. So it's just fun to think about and I
also want you to think about really truly how are you
feeling because I know I wear my
emotions on my sleeve. I wear my heart on my sleeve, and it's,
it's sometimes a little too obvious to my kids when I'm nervous or I'm
anxious, and our kids can feel that. So I think moving forward for
the next 8 days, I think Gwen said, we have, let's all
try to be positive, encouraging, excited about the
school year, and I think that's going to help our kids. So,
um, I think I skipped 10, I think my,
yes, my slides got a little mixed up. So I'm gonna start
here, uh, with good routines, and I know Sabrina kind of touched
on some of these things, so I'm gonna zip through it, but just kind of highlight
the important things that Um, starting with good routines with our
kids is essential, especially now, I don't know if some
of your kids attended ESY, maybe they went to summer camp, maybe they were
home all summer, but the routine getting back to school is helpful for
us and it's helpful for them, and it's really, really helpful for the
classroom setting once they get into there. So good routines are
characterized by consistency, structure, and
flexibility, and they should be personalized. So we're going to talk about
how to make it fun for you, fun for your kids.
So getting ready for going back to school and getting ready in the morning and
then maybe things in the afternoon doing homework, they don't feel so bad
because we personalize it and kind of bring their interest in and make it a little bit
more fun. So we want to be consistent. We want to use routines
daily, and I love this picture with the phone because that looks like
my phone. And as my co-workers who are on here, I have alerts all day
long, and my husband, it drives him nuts, but I would not survive
without alerts. So I do something in the morning. It's called a victory
pose, and there's all kinds of things involved with it, but I have an
alarm every morning, do the victory pose because I'll forget.
Um, so even if it's You know, time to get ready for school
or setting alarms. A lot of our kids have devices. Maybe they don't have a
phone, but maybe they have an iPad, and you can literally do like a
schedule routine on the iPad with alarms. So
an audible alarm for getting dressed, audible alarm for
brushing your teeth. Um, anything like that, it's just helpful to
remind us, we are all busy and we all forget things.
Um, so I already, like, those slides were switched, I
apologize, um, but also structure, OK? So we want
to teach and model the expected behaviors of the routine.
Most of the time when people are not exhibiting a behavior, they don't know exactly
what's expected of them. So we need to model, be the good role
models. So many of you may not have to get up in the morning and get
dressed for work. Many of you do. But if you don't, maybe
consider that. If you're having some resistance from your child, think about, well, they see
me in my pajamas drinking my coffee, they might think, oh, I want to
stay home with mom or dad or whoever's at home at the time. So maybe model
those behaviors, get, get into the routine with them. Get dressed,
brush your teeth next to them, and model those behaviors that you want to see, and make
it fun. You might need those additional visual supports. I have a
checklist for, for, I've had it, I had it with my older son, and I have it
with my youngest daughter, and they need to do checklists because they
absolutely forget things. Um, make it, incorporate a
fun song, even if you make it up, um, and it's just goofy
that relates to brushing teeth or eating breakfast to make
it more exciting. Use Preferred objects or interests. So
maybe your child is very resistant to,
um, you know, again, I'm thinking of brushing teeth. I'm trying to rush through. So,
um, maybe you get a really cool toothbrush to make it more fun for
them to brush their teeth. Um, for morning routines, for
any routine, for all kinds of visuals, this is
a great resource. So if you need those added visual supports
for, um, again, morning, evening routines,
behavior sheets. Things like that. This
website that you can access is, it's called social workers
toolbox.com. Don't be dismayed and think it's only for social workers. They
have a huge section for parent resources, and you could find something like
this. So if you are able to print from home, you could
print visuals that will help you support, um, any
routine that you need, but you could do something like this. I always
like to say that, and hopefully this works, it doesn't need to
be pretty to be functional. You can get colored
post-its at the Dollar Tree, make your own sheet on a piece
of copy paper, and just have different activities for the morning,
different activities for the evening, like you see here. I like the color coding because
there's a lot of kids that really need that distinction between
activities, so the colors kind of pop and they can see the different colors. You could
number these, um, and do them in the order they're supposed to do,
do them. Post it again, you can get them at the Dollar Tree. They're
relatively cheap. You could use these daily and have your child pull them
off to indicate that the activity is finished. So there's a lot of different things you could
do, but just remember to be consistent, use these
additional supports as needed to help your child. This, these
are, I liked this visual because it reminded me of brunch and a lovely,
easy morning. So I thought, what are some other Easy
activities, and practical ways that can get you started in the
morning with ease. There are many videos in the interest of
time. I'm not gonna show you these right now, but these are all from
YouTube. This is one that's geared more towards, I would say middle
school kids. It's a little, you know, singsongy. They do sing a
song, but they talk about at 7 o'clock, I get. I take my shower
at 7:30. I eat breakfast with my family. So
they're really cute and, um, you know, exciting for kids
that do like to watch videos, that do like to interact
with song and music in the morning. And this is all about the morning routine.
Now, you might have, um, a child that likes to be
videoed themselves. Maybe their sibling, so you could even make
your own video and maybe their brother and sister wants to be the star
and you can make a video of their them getting ready and then
you watch that with your child. Like these are the steps we have to do to get ready. So
it's just another idea. This one, Gracie's Corner, really cute
videos with songs. There's a back to school one. There's a morning routine
one. There are also lots of videos. Danny Go,
Go Noodle, all of these different um people
or organizations that make videos that have um
different dances and movement. So that can really be motivating
if your kid really likes to get, is active to begin with, but really likes to
get moving and stuff like that. That maybe each morning you designate a part
of that routine as we're going to get up and we're gonna do this, this song and
dance. So maybe you think, ah, these look a little too elementary. I have
a secondary kid or my student, my child is not really into
the music and dance. Maybe you have a time where just the two of you, you
do positive affirmations. And again, I know, you know, some
people think, oh, that sounds really cheesy, but We
really want to set the stage for a good day, right? And, and I
think just all of us encouraging each other and saying positive
things, like, it's gonna be a great day. I can do difficult things.
Um, I am smart. I, I can tell
people how I feel. Whatever it is that you want to encourage your child to do,
it's gonna build you up too. And I, and I really think it's very,
a great way to start your day. And again, building that into the
routine is something you do each and every day. Maybe it's
yoga. A lot of people like yoga. And again, there's many
videos all over YouTube with yoga videos, mindfulness
videos where it's just deep breathing and things like that. So maybe
that's something. Or what about a purposeful or fun chore? So
maybe you have a pet and you say, every day, oh yeah, we're gonna
feed. I don't know, we have, we have a guinea pig in this household, which
I I can't believe we have, but that's part
of the morning routine. Feed the guinea pig. You know, if that's something your
child likes to do, um, maybe checking the weather app. Maybe
it's fun to get on and look at different apps and say, oh, what's the weather gonna be like
this week? Let's check on it today. Or I, I know we were talking about food
and I saw one of the comments about the menu. Maybe it's part of your routine
that every day you Check the menu to see what's going to be for breakfast, what's gonna be for
lunch, um, or maybe they help you take food out for that
night, that, that night's dinner. So that might motivate them. If my kids
ask all the time, what are we having for dinner? And they ask it in the morning.
So maybe that's something that you can have them take part in. It just
helps get that routine going and really incorporates some fun
into You know, what's not necessarily fun. Getting ready
for school, sometimes getting ready for work, as we all know, is not necessarily the thing that we
always want to do. So make it fun. And with
routines, being consistent, you also need to
be flexible. So as much as we say, routines, routines, routines, stick with
your routine. We also need to teach flexibility. So just
in short, if there are changes in your routine and your
child adapts to it well, please reinforce them. Please praise them
for accepting changes. It's Hard for all of us in life to accept
changes, but it's, it's a very critical skill for a lot of our
kids because some of them are very rigid and don't accept change very well.
So even within having routines every day, reinforcing
that flexibility and adaptability to change is really, really
critical. So building success. So how can we do this?
The first week of school is going to be hard. Maybe the
first several weeks of school are going to be hard, and it's
going to be a change for all of us. So maybe the first week,
the first couple weeks, you provide some additional help for your
kid. So maybe it's, you know, your child can get dressed, but the
first few days, they just do not want. to get out of bed. So maybe you take the
clothes and put them closer to them. Maybe you help them put the shoes on.
Maybe you get their, their toothbrush and toothpaste out for them ready
just to build that success. You want them to have a good week. You want
them to have, you know, every week we want to be good, but especially that first
week, how can we make it good for them? Maybe you set daily and weekly
goals. So maybe you say, you know what? At the end of
this week, if you get ready every day within 10 minutes,
we're gonna have some extra time at the park, or we're gonna have, I'll give you
extra time on the computer or the video games, whatever it may be, but you can,
you can reinforce them. We always want to reinforce the behaviors that we
see, so you might have to actually do a little bit more, especially at
the beginning. You can fade that out over time, but
definitely at the beginning, I would suggest giving some extra support
and then um. You know, reinforcing those behaviors.
Again, from social workers toolbox, you got that link. They have
things like this that you can print out and you can make your own, of course, and
you can get them all over the internet, but this is just another example. They have meal
tickets. Um, if you don't want to go out and spend money on the pizza and
McDonald. which I would rather not do also. Um, maybe
extra time on the video games, extra computer time. Maybe you'll
do their chore. So maybe that's a, that's a great reinforcer option
that, you know what, hey, listen, you get ready, um, within 10 minutes
every day this week, I'll clean up your room this weekend. It's just an
idea. We have to be creative. Um, so start prepping now. So
what can you do now? And these go, you know, these are kind of obvious, but
still, begin waking up earlier and going to bed earlier. Make it
intentional where you're really trying to get back into that routine. Start
practicing the morning and evening routines. I didn't really talk a lot about. Evening
routines, but even now, I'm forcing my daughter to read a
lot more because we didn't admittedly, I did not do enough
over the summer with her. So I'm trying to get her back into the,
the field of doing work after school. You're going to have to do a lot of
it coming up here. Um, how about personalizing school supplies to build that
motivation? Again, if you have a child that really is resistant to
school, try if you can to make their
their school items really personalized, the things that they're going to want to
hold, they're going to want to carry. There's lots of free events to get free school
supplies, uh, but maybe you put a, if you need those, but maybe you put
a sticker on it, or maybe you, uh, write their name really cool on
the backpack so they feel proud to walk around with that, you know.
Um, also, Sabrina kind of talked about some of these things, but
drive by the school or look on the school's website, especially if your child's going to a new
school, familiarize them with what it's going to look like. Go to
the school's meet and greet or open house, whatever they call it. I know Sabrina
mentioned that, uh, connect with your child's teacher to discuss any changes,
especially that happened over the summer. So any medication changes, any changes
in their interests or things like that. If you're, you know, at the same school
and they kind of know your child. But if not, and I know Sabrina mentioned
this, prepare the personal information sheet. When I was a teacher,
that was such a gift. When parents would give me
really in-depth information about their child, it just sets you off on the
right foot that you can start knowing this child,
um, and really knowing some intimate details that will help them be successful.
And then finally reward yourself, OK? Because
this is hard work. It's hard work to do things with
intention to, you know, parent.
And be the best parent all the time. It's very, very
difficult, and you have to be able to reward yourself
somehow. So whatever it is, if you make it the first week,
maybe you take yourself out for some ice cream on Saturday or
do whatever it is to help you to motivate yourself to keep
going, reward yourself, OK? So I wish you all the best.
I hope your kids have a great school year. I hope you have a great school year and thank you
for having me. Thank you so much, Lauren and parents. We
are almost there. We have just one more thing.
um, Andreati is gonna come back to us and share some
information and then we will close it out. All right.
Do you have, do you want me to share? Yeah, can you? I don't have for
some reason. Thank you.
Parents, I know this was a lot of information tonight, but we
really hope that um there were little nuggets of
takeaways that you can utilize and implement here in the coming
days as we count down to back to school. Um, we
would love for you to, Gwen, can you go back one slide? I think there was a
slide right before this. We would love for you to join us.
We are going to, there was a question in the chat. We are going to continue
to host, um, events like this throughout the year,
through our Lunch and Learn series. Um, we'll be sharing out this flyer.
You could take a picture of that. Um, that bitly
link there and the QR code so that you can join us. We would love to have
you. That will be um sessions of more, um,
timely information, you know, things that are happening in September, what's
kind of timely for October, and also more digestible
bites for you. So we hope that you can join us at some of those
sessions and um. In preparation for those lunch and
learn times, the next slide, if you could, um, join
us in taking, giving us some feedback, um, we
would love your feedback. Just we wanna really, um, focus our
leadership team, the directors, our executive director, really, um,
making sure that we're meeting your needs through these meaningful consultation times in
the year ahead. Um, we would love your feedback as far as topics,
things that you're struggling with, um, feedback on what you would like
to see, um, in, in our schools as far as curriculum
resources, maybe it's a system of technology, various
resources, um, and how we can really make sure that we're
utilizing our, um, our funds that we have in
ways that will meet the needs of our. Students, and we want you as families and parents
to collaborate with us around those needs. So, um, if you
could complete this survey for us, that'll help kind of drive our,
our decision making as we, uh, move through the 25, 26 school
year. Again, we appreciate your partnership and we look forward to
collaborating with you, um, as we move into the new year, and we wish
your kiddos all as we see them and greet them
on Monday, August 11th. And thank you
so much Andrea and as we leave Paris, I just personally also want to
thank you and we look forward to a year filled with growth,
achievement, and many successes for all of us. And so having said that,
our executive executive director, Ms. Diane Eagan is
going to give closing remarks. Thank you so much for your attendance
tonight. Diane, are you here? I am here. Thank you so
much for being here tonight and supporting our first event of the year.
I know it was a lot of information, but we plan on sharing the
the um link to the Um, recording not only through
our Jackie's ESC Facebook page, which is our ESC advisory
page, our parent group, but we'll also be sending it out through our
parent link and if for some reason we are not getting our parent links,
you can certainly call our office as soon as you're registered in school,
you'll fall into our parent link and it'll make sure that we get it out to you.
We send it out to over 41,000 parents, so we are.
Super excited that we were able to offer you this event, but we know it was a lot
of information. Please don't hesitate to call our office
or reach out to your schools for individual school
questions, but we're always here to help you, and that's what we find to be the
most important role that we have is making sure that we're here to serve you. Thank
you so much for coming tonight. Don't forget to give us feedback. We love hearing from
you and we think we always can. Consider all of your information. I know we
weren't able to answer all the questions in the chat, but don't hesitate
to reach out to us, and we'll be happy to help you or get some information from
your school. Have a great evening, everyone, and thanks again for your
support and collaboration. We appreciate you. Thanks team for
doing an amazing job presenting tonight. I know it was a mouthful,
but we are thrilled to be able to offer you so much information. Back to you, Gwen.
Good night, everyone, and thanks again for joining us. We look forward to seeing you at