J-T Podcast tackles issue
For a longer discussion about the elementary behavior problems being seen in the Marysville District, listen to Thursday’s episode of the Journal-Tribune Podcast. The podcast can be found on all popular streaming platforms like Spotify and Apple Podcasts.
—
Behavior problems are exploding at elementary schools and the Marysville District is creating a new position in each building to help with the problem.
Starting next school year, the district will hire five registered behavioral technicians to be both reactive and proactive with students who act out in class. Each elementary building will be assigned a technician who can assist teachers during student outbursts as well as helping develop strategies that might help avoid such incidents in the future.
A recent USA Today article quoted a national survey that found more than 70% of 1,000 educators surveyed said student behavior now is worse than it was before the years impacted by COVID-19. That percentage is higher than a similar survey conducted in 2021, meaning the problem is not lessening as it moves farther from the disruptions caused by the pandemic.
Older residents might feel school discipline has simply gone soft, but Kristen Jones, principal at Mill Valley Elementary, said the types of outburst being seen from young students now are both dangerous and disruptive.
“We’re seeing a lot more destructive behavior – flipping tables, standing on tables, throwing materials, physically trying to be aggressive with other students or staff,” Jones said. “In those situations, we actually have to remove all the other students from the room in order to de-escalate the child, because sometimes it’s not a safe situation for us to even try to get the student with the behavior out of the room.”
When such an incident occurs, it can take time and manpower to calm the situation.
“It takes a lot of time,” Jones said. “It takes additional people to help that child kind of work through what it is they’re dealing with to get to the root of what’s causing the behavior.”
The elementaries are equipped with areas where disruptive students can be taken to calm down, but those spaces still require adult supervision that often wasn’t available. Each minute the teacher spends with the disruptive student is time lost for the rest of the class.
“Some of the things that we see, now, don’t allow a teacher to just address the behavior and then kind of move on with the day,” Jones said. “When we’re removing kids from a classroom, or if the kid is being so disruptive, it obviously then disrupts the other 20-some kids in the classroom, so those students then can’t go on with their day either.”
Superintendent Diane Allen said the hiring freeze enacted because of the recent levy failure has left buildings running lean on staff, meaning, at times principals or members of the district administrative staff would need to sit with students after an outburst.
But some situations require numerous staff members to bring under control.
“At times we have students who may just take off running, so in Raymond that presents a different set of challenges for us,” Allen said. “Because there (Raymond) it’s not a neighborhood and so we have different systems in place to address when that happens.”
Jones said the types of behavior problems vary widely with very young students because they do not yet know how to process the emotions they are experiencing.
“With our really little ones, like a kindergartner, a lot of them haven’t even been in school before, so they have no idea how to respond,” Jones said. “And so, the only way that they know to respond might be to run and then we are chasing a child either through the building or outside and it could be scary because it’s our responsibility to ensure that they’re safe when they’re with us.”
These are the types of situations the district hopes to avoid by creating the new behavioral technician positions. The Mental Health and Recovery Board will cover the costs of training the individuals.
The technicians will be able to help de-escalate situations with students and will be available to spend time with the students through the calming process.
Allen said the time spent with troubled student will allow them to identify what types of things trigger outburst. By logging such data, the technician can work with teachers to develop strategies to avoid future disruptions.
“Our thought is, that our registered behavior technician is kind of trying to oversee some of those behavior plans to help the teacher develop what those plans are and figure out what works for that particular student in terms of what motivates them,” Jones said. “(To determine) what kind of interventions or accommodations can we provide, in the classroom, that allows the student to access their education a little bit better, so we aren’t removing them or the other students from the room all the time.”
Allen said language barriers sometimes escalate behavioral issues among the rapidly-growing Spanish-speaking population in Marysville Schools.
“We also are interested in if there is an applicant that might be bilingual, because we’ve also talked about some challenges we’ve had in that area as well,” Allen said.
The five positions, with a pay rate of $18.71 to $23.86 per hour, should be in place for the start of the 2024-25 school year.
The goal of the program is to give every child a chance to succeed in the classroom, regardless of what challenges they face in other areas of their lives.
“Education is the gateway for everybody’s future,” Allen said.
The days of removing and isolating troubled students are over, according to the educators.
“We really do want every kid to be successful, which is why we develop all of these different behavior plans or try these different strategies,” Jones said. “I really feel like this registered behavior technician position is going to be so helpful, because then we can actually help kids work through some of these things so that they can leave school with academic progress and knowledge.”