Special Education and Student Services Newsletter for December 9

1. Mike Johnson Presentation
Thanks to the 37 parents, school staff, Head Start, Holy Rosary, Human Services, and adult with autism who attended the autism presentation last night.  Mike shared his personal experiences as a father with autism, info on Autism Society of Central Wisconsin, info on Camp Awesum, and answered questions from parents.

2. SLATE Conference
Thanks to the regular and special education staff who attended the School Leaders Advancing Technology in Education Conference this past week.  Handouts and some videos of the presentations are featured at www.slateinwi.com/handouts.

3. AIMS Web Benchmark Testing Window
Fall: Sept 1- Oct 15
Winter: Jan 1-Feb 1
Spring: May 1- June 1

We will plan on setting up times to meet with staff to review your AIMS Web progress monitoring and benchmark scores of your students during the month of January.

4. Kelli Elmhorst
Kelli Elmhorst has accepted a position outside of the school district.  I would like to wish her congratulations on her new adventure and a thank you for her time working here with our students.   Her last day for the school district is December 16.

5. COTA
The Certified Occupational Therapist Assistant full time position has been posted to be replaced.

6. LTS updates
There are no updates on long term substitutes for speech language (February) and school psychologist (March through May).

7. SLD Initial Guidance Technical Workshop
Barb Krenz and Kris Brandner attended this workshop this past week.  They have handouts for anyone interested.  We will be discussing and planning for implementation with a hopeful projected start date of September 1, 2012 in most buildings. More information can be found at: http://www.dpi.state.wi.us/sped/ld.html

8. De-Escalation and Safety Training on January 17
Don Everhard will present safety and de-escalation strategies on January 17 as part of the MASH special education team meeting.  This will start at 3:20 and go until 4:15.  HS sped staff who have not attended earlier presentation should plan on attending.

9. Top 50 Special Education Leaders on Twitter
I was recognized as one of the top 50 Special Education Leaders on Twitter by this website. http://www.bestcollegesonline.com/blog/2011/12/07/50-special-ed-leaders-you-should-follow-on-twitter/. Thanks to the great efforts by staff and the programs in our special education, student services, and educational technology areas which helped us receive this recognition.

10. Job Coach/Employability Skills Trainer
We are looking for anyone interested in a Job Coach/Employability Skills Trainer for our alternative high school.  This position is grant funded and would work from 12:00 to 2:00 or 1:00 to 3:00 during January and February 2012 and then a flexible 10 hours per week for remainder of 11-12 and 12-13. If you know of anyone interested, please let me know.

11. Taylor County Literacy Council
Literacy Coordinator - we are looking for a Literacy Coordinator which is a paid position for 10 hours per week. For more information please contact Cindy Gibson at 715-748-1520 or myself.

Adult Literacy Tutors - we are looking for people who are interested in being Adult Literacy Tutors through the Literacy Council.  If you are interested, please contact Cindy Gibson or myself.

Reading Class for Adults - We are starting a reading class for adults in January. Three adults have already contacted us wanting to learn how to read.  We will be using the Wilson Just Words and/or Wilson Reading program to teach them. If you are interested in being one of these instructors, please contact me.

12. Beth Van der Berg
Welcome back to Beth to van der Berg from her FMLA leave!

13. Rhinelander School District
Rhinelander School District representative recently told one of our special education parents how impressed she is with our programs and services in "little Medford." Thank you to the staff for all the great work that you are doing.

14. Apple iPad Curriculum
I will be starting the process of organizing our iPad applications into curricular and grade level areas for staff.

15. Special Education Family Day at the Movies
Thanks to the 16 families and 50 total family members and teachers who attended our 1st Special Education Family Day at the Movies on December 3.  We had special education families from across the district attend.  

16. MAMS Special Education Kitchen Area
Thanks to Brenda Kraegenbrink for taking initiative to pick up supplies and materials for our MAMS Special Education Kitchen Area this past week.

17. PBIS
Positive Behavioral Intervention Supports will be featured as the Curriculum Connection at December Board of Education meeting.  Thanks to Sue Eloranta, Shelly Woller, Dan Miller, and Don Everhard for their work on this presentation.  Positive Behavioral Intervention Supports is a RTI initiative for behavioral support across the universal, targeted, and intensive tiers. This helps provide earlier and more intensive services for students while not waiting for students to fail and placement in special education before receiving services. http://www.pbis.org/

18. Speech Language
I would like to recognize and send a note of appreciation for our speech and language pathologists Sheryl Balciar, Ann Jochimsen, and Eliza Decker.  We are very fortunate to have these skilled, experienced, hard working, passionate, and caring group of professionals providing therapy and services on behalf of our students with disabilities.

19. Occupational Therapy
Caroline Radlinger is scheduled for knee surgery on January 6th and is anticipated to be gone for 2 weeks.  We will be looking for a replacement during this time.

20. Pre-K Planning and Curriculum Meeting
December 16 at 9:00 am at MAES

21. MAMS and MASH Christmas Program
Support staff that need to work during the MAMS and MASH Christmas Programs to help support our students with disabilities can place this extra time on their time card.

22. ACCESS for ELL Testing Window
Our ACCESS for ELL testing materials have arrived.  The testing window is December 1 to February 10.

We have delegated the testing duties as follows in the past:

MAES and SES = Lucia Albrecht
MAMS = Jessica Martin
MASH = Barb Krenz

ACCESS for ELL testing is required by the State to assess the English Language Proficiency of our ELL students.  Further information on ACCESS for ELL can be found at: http://dpi.wi.gov/oea/access.html.