Orcutt Union School District staff were delighted to welcome students back to school the week of August 11. From visiting campuses and talking to students, parents, and staff, I can attest that smiles and good vibes abound at our schools. Along with raising academic achievement and fostering partnerships with parents and our greater community, one of our top priorities for the 2025-2026 school year is to work toward improved student behavior. Since the COVID-19 pandemic, schools around the country have been encountering a host of behavioral issues, and Orcutt is no exception. Our elementary schools have needed to handle extremely severe student behaviors, including threats and incidents in which students injured other students or staff. All of our schools are managing an increased amount of chronic misbehavior.
           We are responding to these trends by taking action on several fronts, all associated with our district’s Multi Tiered System of Support (MTSS) plan for student behavior. The foundation of the plan includes how we teach and promote positive behaviors with all students:

● Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports (PBIS) is an evidence-based program for communicating each school’s behavioral expectations to students and providing incentives and accountability to encourage students to meet the expectations. 
● Social, Emotional, and Ethical (SEE) Learning is a district-adopted curriculum for teaching self-awareness, self-regulation, interpersonal awareness, compassion for others, and relationship skills.
● Digital Citizenship lessons from Common Sense Education help students learn how to be safe and responsible when online. Topics include safe online habits, data privacy, cyberbullying, and online harms. In describing these foundational programs, we want to emphasize that we do not expect students to be perfect. What we strive for, though, is to have the misbehavior we encounter be more about students learning and recovering from a mistake and less about students getting stuck in a pattern of repeated mistakes. Meanwhile, we have utilized Local Control and Accountability Plan (LCAP) funding to bolster our ability to meet social-emotional and behavioral needs. We are implementing the following actions: 
● Adding behavioral support staff so that the district will have three Board Certified Behavior Analysts (BCBAs) and seven Registered Behavior Technicians (RBTs) for 2025-2026; 
● Adding staff counselors and psychologists so every elementary site in the district has its own full-time staff counselor and full-time school psychologist (secondary sites already have this);
● Adding special day classes so students with disabilities have an expanded continuum of placement options; 
● Adding vice-principal support for elementary schools; and 
● Allocating funding for professional development for staff in trauma informed practice, behavioral intervention, and crisis prevention intervention.

           We have processes that support student safety as well. Each site has an MTSS Team to discuss behavioral challenges and map out best next steps. The district also has a behavior problem-solving committee for action-planning around the most vexing situations. 

     Parents are integral in all of these efforts. Parents receive regular communication about behavioral expectations and are enlisted as partners on behalf of their child. 

          Students also are key. In our ongoing “See Something, Say Something” campaign, we talk to our students about letting us or a trusted adult know if/when they see or experience something concerning on campus or on social media. 

          Put all of this together – teaching positive behavior, providing specialized support when needed, having processes to analyze and improve behavior, and seeking help from parents and students – and we believe our district will be in a position to help students to be at their best in 2025-2026. 

          “We can address student needs from every angle – mental health, disability-related, something going on at home, or whatever else is happening,” says Christy Callaghan, the district’s executive director of Special Education. “We look at the student as a whole, support them, and get them exactly what they need. And we will support teachers to help their students. With this comprehensive approach, we look forward to a good school year.”