Education summit hears of Austin ISD's "wraparound" services to help students in crisis
AUSTIN, Texas — The Austin ISD Board of Trustees is considering a plan to avoid a state conservatorship of the district's special education programs. Parents have complained about a backlog of special education evaluations and the Texas Education Agency is unhappy the district has been unable to fix the problem.
But the district has its hands full taking care of other issues impacting its students and their families. While state regulators focus on Austin ISD's special education, the school district is also trying to help other students at risk of academic and social challenges that come from trauma or crisis in their lives.
A student’s mental well-being can take a hit from a life-changing event whether it's food insecurity, dealing with homelessness, or even a natural disaster. Twyla Williams, who leads crisis counseling for Austin ISD, on Thursday participated in an education summit presented by the child and family advocacy group Children At Risk.
She told them, “As we see the needs of our students, we address them by identifying what those needs are, seeing what services they are receiving, and seeing what direction we need to take them in. So, we either add services and so we have a way that we monitor the students weekly."
She explained Austin ISD came up with a plan to support a student with wraparound services after a meeting with all the important adults in their lives. That meeting can include parents & guardians, school administrators, and mental health professionals.
In other cities, mental health services may come from outside vendors, but in Austin ISD this is done in-house.
Williams says, “Those internal vendors are our licensed mental health professionals who are able to provide short-term therapy for our students."
Claire Dutreix, a senior associate director for Children At Risk liked what she heard. She said it was, “So awesome. As a former teacher, I understand just the pivotal role that all these players can play in a child's education and really take some alleviation off teachers."
There are also outside non-profits ready to jump in and help, but of course, it comes down to finding funding. Byron Sanders is CEO of Dallas-based Big Thought, He says, “What I would love for us to see is if we could make a deeper investment in extended day opportunities, enrichment opportunities if we can make a deeper investment in what's traditionally considered out-of-school time experiences."