Fix School Discipline Toolkit for Educators | Page 53

that had been successful at other schools and she
didn’t get the desired effects. She felt like she was ill
prepared to teach these students and felt sorrow at
how academically and socially behind the students
already were.
BA: What I learned is that what our students need the
most is not negative consequences and zero tolerance
policies. What our students need is absolutely
consistent and urgent support around maintaining
appropriate behavior. They need to feel valued and
confident in school. The traditional model says,
“Throw kids out for refusing to listen to you.” After a
couple of weeks of experiencing more of what we had
experienced the first day, we held school-wide staff
meeting and asked, “What can we do differently?”

How then did you decide to implement PBIS and
SEL?
BA: We initially received an inclusive practices
training. The only part of that training that was
particularly good was PBIS, as a subset of inclusive
practices. We are a full inclusion model school. This
means that all of our special education students are
mainstreamed and receive instruction in the same
classroom as our regular education students. . We
further sought out training from the employees of
Ravenswood because the demographics of their
schools are similar to ours and they had been
implementing PBIS as part of a court settlement and
seeing dramatic and good results for children. We
also attended a PBIS training by Placer County Office
of Education.
We had heard about the Collaborative for Academic,
Social, and Emotional Learning’s (CASEL’s)
Collaborating Districts Initiative (CDI) because
Sacramento is one of the districts collaborating
with CASEL. Through CDI, the District received a

planning grant of $125,000 and was eligible to apply
for an implementation grant. This grant paid for
whatever the district and CASEL decided would be
best. In our case, the grant paid for Second Step, a
multimedia SEL curriculum that assists teachers with
teaching SEL skills in the classroom, and which costs
about $3,000. Cory and I heard that there would be a
CASEL meeting at the District. We assertively invited
ourselves to the meeting. Getting resources to help
your school improve sometimes takes aggressive
advocacy.

How can other school and district leaders bring
PBIS and SEL into their schools?
BA: I would recommend that other Principals and
educators contact the PBIS main office for their
region or county, if one exists. At Placer County
Office of Education, as a part of their special
education team, they had PBIS experts and were
using federal Individuals with Disability Education
Act funding to help schools like ours implement
PBIS. I also really recommend contacting CASEL
directly; they are very helpful people who will provide
guidance about implementing SEL in your school.

What changes did you make to your curriculum or
school structure to implement PBIS and SEL?
BA: At the time, we had two curriculum instruction
training specialists. We designated one of those
training specialists to be a full time SEL and PBIS
person. While instruction is very important,
Academic Percentage Index (API) points are not
immediately important to the families we serve.
We eliminated the Dungeon because it was stupid.
When you are dealing with kids who are disengaged
with school it doesn’t make any sense to F