The district reported 21 restraint incidents during the 2024–25 school year, affecting 10 students and resulting in seven staff injuries, officials said at the Aug. 7 Board of Directors meeting.

Jamie Sullivan, the district’s Special Education coordinator, told the board, “for 20 fourtwenty 5, our total number of restraint incidences were 21. And, from resulting in staff injury were 7. And of the 21 incidences, it was 10 students.”

The report said training and equipment were implemented last spring and again during this year’s staff in-service week. Sullivan said the district instituted two staff training days last spring — one in March and one in April — and provided additional in‑site training for teachers and instructional assistants. “All equipment has been ordered and distributed to their classrooms,” she said.

Board members asked whether injuries occurred before or after the new training and whether some students had repeated incidents. Sullivan said some injuries predated the training and “there were a few injuries in May and June” and one during summer school. She confirmed that some incidents were recurring for the same students.

Board members pressed the administration about thresholds for removing a student from a classroom and minimizing disruption to peers and staff. Sullivan said behavior supports are written into individualized education programs and that the district contracts with an outside behavior health and wellness team from SOESD to provide coaching and supports. “That coaching is gonna continue this year,” she said.

The district said it is tightening incident-reporting procedures so injuries are logged even when they do not result in a workers’ compensation claim. Sullivan said some staff injuries were minor bruises and not all were reported to insurance; she said she could supply a breakdown of which injuries were reported to workers’ compensation. A board member asked for counts of room clears and other measures of disrupted learning; Sullivan said room‑clear data was not available at the meeting but could be provided.

Board members and staff discussed the legal obligation to consider whether behavior is related to a student’s disability; Sullivan said educators must consider that and write supports into students’ plans. Board members noted state rules limiting exclusion and the district’s obligation to keep students as included as possible while protecting staff and peers.

Sullivan said the district is making a “big push for all incidents to be reported, whether they’re reported to workers comp, so we can track and see where our issues are.”

The board did not take formal action on the report at the meeting; staff said follow-up material — including detailed counts of injuries reported to insurance and room‑clear numbers — would be provided to the board later.

The district framed the training and outside support as ongoing work to reduce staff injuries and to create safer classrooms.

The board’s discussion also flagged two operational points for follow up: (1) a breakdown of which of the seven staff injuries were submitted to insurance and which were logged only internally, and (2) counts of room clears and measures of disrupted instruction to compare against student‑outcome data.