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Educator urges districtwide proactive behavior supports, cites staffing and caseload gaps
Summary
Laura Holloway, a learning resource specialist at Mark Twain Elementary, told the board the district faces rising behavioral needs and uneven caseloads, urged adoption of proactive behavior plans, more training for paraprofessionals, and use of evidence-based curricula like RULER.
Laura Holloway, a learning resource specialist from Mark Twain Elementary, told the board that staff are seeing extreme burnout and mounting behavioral support needs that the district’s current systems are not fully meeting. "We need to make some conscious decisions going forward by implementing some long term systems..." she said, calling for equitable allocation of paraprofessional assistance, clearer staffing for speech-language and autism supports, and proactive rather than reactive behavior interventions.
Holloway specifically asked the board to consider districtwide implementation of evidence-based social-emotional learning and behavior supports, citing the RULER curriculum from Yale as a research-based tool already in some buildings. She noted some schools still have combined specialist roles (speech-language pathologist and autism consultant in one position) that create unsustainable caseloads and recommended funded, ongoing training and coaching for paraprofessionals and building administrators to support fidelity of implementation.
