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District strategic plan update: discipline calibration, PBIS training and a slight uptick in alcohol incidents; county prevention grant discontinued
Summary
District staff reported on strategic-plan tools, cross-school calibration of discipline data, staff training plans and school drug/alcohol incident counts; officials also said a county grant for prevention work was discontinued and Head Start faces possible layoffs that could affect local early learning.
District staff presented a strategic-plan update that tied together a new board data dashboard, ongoing calibration work on discipline data, plans for professional development and an account of recorded drug and alcohol incidents across district campuses.
The district said the board dashboard is live for trustees to view and that this year will serve as a baseline for calibrated discipline coding — distinguishing the "four majors" (defiance, disrespect, disruption and noncompliance) and aligning which incidents are managed in-classroom versus office-managed. Staff described "stepping stones" and discovery classes as tiered supports and said the district has increased teams working on transitions (elementary-to-middle and middle-to-high) to share academic and behavior data for placements.
On professional development, the district said teams will attend a PBIS conference in April and that funds for travel came from a safety/title grant rather than the general fund. Staff said district-surveyed needs emphasized de-escalation training and building staff skills to avoid becoming behavior triggers; staff will incorporate parent-facing modules into staff training.
Staff also reported incident counts the district is tracking: at Grants Pass High School there were five alcohol incidents reported on campus so far this year; South Middle School had 11 drug incidents and two paraphernalia incidents; Gladiola High School showed 10 drug incidents, two paraphernalia incidents and three alcohol incidents. Combined across campuses, staff said the district is roughly six incidents higher than this time last year. When asked, staff clarified the counts include school-sponsored events and activities (for example, dances and athletic events) and off-campus incidents tied to school functions (buses, games) are included when school-sponsored.
District staff told the board they were notified during spring break that a county prevention grant used for school outreach and classroom presentations had been discontinued; staff said the grant had originally been about $110,000 and that roughly $32,000 remained in program funds, and that Josephine County school outreach officers will continue limited prevention education. The district said there were no identified replacement funds at the time of the meeting. Staff said some planned summer and follow-up activities will be curtailed because funding ended.
Staff also warned the board that Southern Oregon Head Start had notified the district it would lay off a large number of employees if federal funding did not come through by an April date; district staff said such layoffs would affect the Grants Pass child development center if the funding gap was not resolved.
Board members questioned whether mobility data and school demographics were being tracked as part of discipline and outcome analyses; staff said mobility is tracked in a state system and that teams will include mobility and behavior support plans in transition discussions.
The strategic-plan and discipline items were presented as informational updates; the board did not take policy action on these items during the meeting.
