Summary
The current disciplinary event is the meeting in regards to the disciplinary change in placement, thus, the removal of the student in question. Due to learning and behavioral issues, the committee is willing to review the Individualized Educational Program (IEP) and Behavior Intervention Plan (BIP) that have been implemented prior. The school personnel has decided to conduct the disciplinary event because the suspensions caused by inappropriate behavior have been occurring more frequently, and new incidents highlight the need for involvement in further goals and alterations to the individualized program.
Drugs/Injuries
The student is not on any medications, which means that the actions have not been influenced by prescriptions that may have resulted in psychological disturbances. Moreover, no bodily injures have been reported either by the student in question or peers who had altercations with Levhone Elijah White. Despite the lack of reported physical injuries, the violent episodes put the student and other people attending the school in danger. Thus, the verbal and physical abuse has been harmful in terms of class disruptions, the well-being of several students, and the overall educational process.
Relevant Information
The inappropriate behavior is frequent and manifests both physical and verbal. There are 16 registered incidents between August 26th, 2021, and January 13th, 2022, where problem behavior has been observed in terms of altercations with teachers and other students. Moreover, no favorable changes would suggest that the measures taken by the school, which were mostly suspensions, have led to a positive effect in terms of behavioral changes. The incidents have different causes as assessed by teachers and observers and were directed toward both mentors and other students. Moreover, certain behavioral actions were directly addressed towards the goal of avoiding specific tasks and assignments that the student has difficulties with in regard to following instructions and concentrating. Both the academic and behavioral performances have been evaluated, and the actions that have resulted in suspensions were documented. The parents were notified of the events that have led to restrictions in attending school.
The disruptive actions of the student include striking another student in the eye on September 1st, 2021, inappropriate touching on September 21st, assault on May 10th, 2021, verbal abuse directed towards a teacher on November 12th, 2021, and other similar incidents that suggest the student’s behavior is inappropriate and measures shall be taken.
The needed implementations are also motivated by the fact that the behavioral incidents are understood by the student, yet no inclination towards change is perceived. Levhone is aware of the measures that follow inappropriate conduct. The teachers have tried to mitigate the adverse events by warning the student in question in regard to possible suspensions and other repercussions that correlate with inappropriate actions at school. Levhone understands that such actions are not permitted, yet the incidents did not become less frequent. Moreover, a pattern has been observed when it comes to the triggers that cause behavioral misconduct, which has also been reported by the teachers. Thus, certain circumstances are more likely to cause an outburst and, as a result, verbal, physical, or disciplinary misconduct. The reported causes include not understanding the task that the student is supposed to accomplish, the desire to receive attention, and the aim to avoid working on a particular goal. Moreover, the most frequent behavioral problems have occurred during large group meetings and individual seatwork assignments. On the opposite, less frequent behavioral problems correlate with either small group meetings or individual instruction-based tasks. The findings also suggest that the prior conclusions in regard to the causes of disruptive behavior are, indeed, an illustration of the student’s aim to receive attention, avoid certain tasks, and show vulnerability to the inability to accomplish the goal successfully.
The conclusion of the supervisors is that the student is fully aware of the consequences of his behavior, and the incidents are not influenced by his disability. Moreover, the incidents are becoming more severe, and certain actions have not been previously exercised by Levhone. An example is an incident in which the student inappropriately touched the breasts of a fellow female student. Such actions have not been observed or reported before, which illustrates that the frequency and the nature of the behavioral problems are becoming more critical. Based on the findings linked to the academic and functional performance assessment, the student showed relatively low indicators for both areas.
Parent Involvement
Parents have reported worries in regard to their son’s problems in math. Due to the low scores that have been examined and reported, the student’s mother has expressed concern in regard to the academic performance of the child. The concerns have influenced the mother to consider tutoring to improve her educational performance since the struggles with this particular subject are present even when help is being provided. Moreover, the mother has also reported being worried about the behavioral problems that teachers report after each incident involving the dismissal of instruction, verbal abuse, and physical altercations.
IEP Goals
The academic areas that have been examined are math, reading, and language, which illustrate how the student is able to express thoughts, follow instructions, and communicate. The findings reveal that there are challenges with all the domains examined through the assessment. For example, the math assessment has shown difficulties in achieving the given tasks in terms of respecting the time limit. Other conclusions include the student’s limitation in expressing himself since only simple sentences have been reported during the evaluation. Teachers and parents have different scores when it comes to evaluating the student’s abilities for learning, aggressive behavior, and perceived communication with peers. Thus, the behavior is perceived as different when at home and in the school environment. This suggests that the disability of the student does not cause behavioral challenges with parents, which also illustrates that the diagnosis does not cause problems at school. The IEP academic goals include accuracy in reading (90 words/minute, 90% accuracy), answering comprehension questions (80%), solving math problems (80%), and utilizing adequate attention-getting techniques (80%). Other goals have also been implemented to assist the student in both educational and behavioral challenges.
IEP Implementations
The student’s IEP includes several accommodations, modifications, and supplementary services that are to be implemented. Thus, the first modification is implementing an extended schedule for up to 30 minutes. Since the difficulties in learning and understanding have been concluded to be partially influenced by the limited time, adding up to 30 minutes to English language art classes will allow teachers to pay attention to certain subjects that are to be evaluated or explained, and the student will be able to improve his academic performances through being less time-restricted. Moreover, another challenge that has been reported is the inability of the student to maintain favorable behavior under the condition of extensive testing with multiple peers in the same classroom. Thus, the alteration includes testing in small groups when the evaluation implies more than ten questions and the timing is estimated for more than 30 minutes for the assignment. Since math is another subject that the student struggles with, the aim is to extend the scheduled time for up to 30 minutes. Moreover, the assignments are to be read out loud by the computer during online learning and by an adult during in-person meetings. The same goes for testing within small groups of a maximum of ten students in case there are more than ten questions and the test lasts for more than 30 minutes. Similar changes are to be implemented to address the challenges that have been examined during the reading test. Thus, the modification includes an additional 30 minutes to the schedule and changes when it comes to the number of students partaking in the testing in case the evaluation is extended.
BIP
The student also has a Behavioral Intervention Plan (BIP) based on the Functional Behavioral Assessment. The areas mentioned in the plan are centered around the student’s lack of desire to comply with the instructions given by teachers and disrupting the educational process. The two areas that are being addressed include his getting up without permission during class and speaking out during class, which is inconvenient for teachers in terms of conducting lessons and other students in regard to receiving the necessary information.
Behavioral Patterns
As mentioned prior, certain incidents that have occurred were exceptional since no similar actions have been reported before. This is the case for the behavior problem related to the inappropriate touching of a female student on the breasts. Moreover, Levhone was aware of the negative consequences and the unacceptable connotation of the actions mentioned previously. This illustrates that the prior implementations have not ameliorated behavioral disturbances. Instead, the intensity is emphasized even more, primarily due to the fact that such incidents have never occurred before.
Behavioral Issues Frequency
Disruptions during classes, such as the denial to comply with the instructions, may be explained by the disability. Teachers have reported that Levhone often avoids specific tasks by causing disruptions, which can be ameliorated through the implementation in regards to the Behavioral Intervention Plan. However, the increase in the frequency and intensity of the incidents and the student’s understanding of such actions being negative suggests that no improvement was observed in the recent school year.
The Impact of the Disability
The behavioral pattern suggests that certain activities are not associated with the disability. Aggression is more critical at school compared to the reports given by the parents in terms of behavior at home. Thus, triggers such as the presence of big groups of people, not understanding tasks, and inability to comply with academic goals are direct causes of such incidents. According to researchers, children with diagnosed disabilities have problems when it comes to learning and studying on the same level as children without such a diagnosis (Grimes et al., 2018). Thus, the frustration that follows low performance, crowded classes, and a lack of individual approaches to the needs of the students is, most likely, partially determined by the disability. Based on these arguments, the behaviors that can be attributed to the disability are the disruptions of classes. On the other hand, physical and verbal abuse that is often unprovoked and addressed to other students are more likely behavioral expressions unrelated to the diagnosis of the student.
IEP Effectiveness
The conduct in question may be the result of the school district’s failure to implement the IEP. The academic year in which the student had to shift from regular education to remote one has been adverse, as accentuated by the intensification of behavioral challenges. After remote learning, the incidents became more frequent, and the characteristics of the event became more disruptive. More physical altercations and inappropriate actions have been reported after the school’s involvement became less significant. This suggests that the negative implications are partly caused by the lack of involvement of the teachers and the lack of monitoring and improvement measures that may have ameliorated the negative consequences. Since no positive alterations have been observed in terms of behavioral and academic performances, IEP has not been proficient in goal setting and achieving. The goals have not been reached, and only certain measures have elevated compared to the previous examination. However, the current results that are presented in the evaluation paper show a lack of necessary techniques to assist the student in expressing himself clearly, which may be one of the causes of such frequent disruptions. Instead, the implementations are focused on addressing the student’s verbal altercations. Moreover, the math examination has shown that the student is able to accomplish the set goals and objectives, yet the time limit has resulted in poor performance.
As assessed by examining the evidence and the reports that cover both educational and behavioral challenges that the student exemplifies, the verbal and physical abuse directed towards other students is likely not a result of the disability. On the other hand, the causes of class disturbances, such as frustration with complex tasks and crowded classrooms, may be triggered by the diagnosis. The prior efforts were not enough to lead to corrections, and more effort has to be implemented toward the amelioration of the challenges.
Reference
Grimes, S., Southgate, E., Scevak, J., & Buchanan, R. (2018). University student perspectives on institutional non-disclosure of disability and learning challenges: Reasons for staying invisible. International Journal of Inclusive Education, 23(6), 639–655. Web.