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Avon Grove considers teletherapy to replace Community in Schools as grant ends; trustees weigh relationship loss against ~$159,000 savings
Summary
District pupil-services staff proposed replacing in-person Community in Schools (CIS) support with a districtwide teletherapy contract that would maintain case management and psychiatry referrals while reducing next-year contracted services from roughly $922,000 to $762,000; trustees asked administrators to return with implementation details and equity safeguards.
The district’s pupil-services lead presented a cost-and-service review on April 7 that asked the board to consider a teletherapy model as the current community-partner grant for in-person Community in Schools (CIS) support comes to an end.
District staff framed the conversation as a fiscal and service-delivery question: continuing CIS in two buildings would require the district to fund 100 percent of the current community partner’s cost next year; switching to an online teletherapy vendor would extend some services to all buildings and reduce contracted services spending by about $159,000 in year one, the presentation showed.
“We would pick up a 100% of that for next year,” the presenter said, and explained the financial comparison: “If we were to venture down an online resource or teletherapy, the difference is about $159,000… instead of $922 [thousand], it would be $762 [thousand] in contracted services.”
The staff recommendation was to explore teletherapy as an option and return with vendor comparisons and operational details. Administrators outlined trade-offs: teletherapy could expand access (including psychiatry appointments and after‑hours scheduling) and serve additional buildings, but it would be remote rather than in-person; CIS staff currently run face-to-face groups and serve as case managers onsite.
Trustees voiced concern that teletherapy would reduce the personal connection and that in-person CIS had documented gains for the district. One trustee urged staff to look for alternative funding sources or collaborative arrangements with nearby districts before terminating the CIS contract. Another asked the administration to bring back a narrower proposal and potential grant opportunities.
Next steps: The board directed staff to develop a vendor briefing and a costed implementation plan and to present a teletherapy overview at the May meeting so the board can meet CIS notification timelines (30 days before June 30) if it wants to change course before next school year.
