Services

The Greater Victoria School District promotes an inclusive education system in which students with special needs are fully participating members of a community of learners. Special education services enable students with special needs to have equitable access to learning and opportunities for achievement in all aspects of their educational programs.

ABA Assistant Request Process

Some students with Autism have an ABA Home or Centre Based Program outside of school. Parents may request an ABA Assistant in order to accommodate the child’s ABA home or Centre Based Program at school. Please consider the following criteria:
The student must meet Ministry of Education Category G criteria for designation (Autism Spectrum Disorder).

The student must be receiving ABA Programming and Support outside of school, either Home-based or Centre-based, and must be supervised by a Board Certified ABA Behavioural Consultant.

Parents must complete the Request for ABA Assistant Parent Form and submit this form to the District Principal of Special Education, Greater Victoria School District by March 31st for consideration for the following school year.

Subsequently, the ABA Behavioural Consultant will be sent a Support Plan Agreement to complete, outlining the student’s ABA home program and confirming that they will provide ABA Programming, Consultation and Planning to the school.

Gifted Education

Gifted Education in Greater Victoria School District

Through the differentiation in heterogeneous classrooms, students who are designated as gifted will be provided with a wide variety of learning opportunities which will enable them to discover, develop and celebrate their strengths, talents, and sustained interests. The instructional planning for students who are designated as gifted is the responsibility of the classroom teacher with support from the school, the district, the home and the community. As stated in the Special Education Policies and Procedures Manual “The Ministry expects that with sufficient training and experience classroom teachers will be capable of including most students who are gifted, and providing a program in which they can be successful, provided that specialized support is available when needed.”

In order to enable all students to meet their potential, schools should develop a profile of the student’s strengths, talents and interests and develop programming which reflects each student’s uniqueness. The teacher assigned responsibility for gifted education (the Contact Teacher) will generally be responsible for identification processes and will primarily work in a collaborative manner to support the classroom teacher in providing differentiated opportunities.

An Overview

Elementary Schools

In the Greater Victoria School District Elementary Schools, the support for identified Gifted students can take many forms. As indicated in the Roles and Responsibilities section, the classroom teacher is responsible for developing educational programs for all students, including those designated as gifted. Other forms of support, including pull-out support may be offered depending on such factors as number of students identified as Gifted and the availability of support staff.

The Greater Victoria School District conducts annual assessment of suggested Grade 4 and 5 students to identify gifted students in all elementary schools throughout the district. The process uses a combination of identification tools which not only test the students’ abilities, but also gets information from each candidate child’s classroom teacher, the student’s parents/guardians, and the student.

Middle Schools

Every Middle School in the Greater Victoria School District has a teacher who has, as part of their teaching duties, responsibility for Gifted education in the school. This teacher is responsible for providing a Gifted education program and development of Gifted students’ Individual Education Plans, in consultation with classroom teachers and parents. The form of this Gifted education support may include support within the regular classroom, special pull out programs or a combination of the two.

Secondary Schools

There are Challenge programs for Gifted and High achieving students available at Mount Douglas Secondary School and Esquimalt Secondary School. Students apply to participate in these programs and information about these programs is available from these schools.

Roles and Responsibilities

District Responsibilities:

The District will provide the following to enable schools to support students who are gifted:

• Formula funding to Elementary and Middle Schools to provide a Gifted Contact Teacher at each school. These positions are 0. FTE at Middle School and are likely to be less in smaller Elementary Schools.
• Annual orientation sessions for contact teachers new to this area of responsibility
• Continued professional development each year in this area
• Criterion and norm-referenced assessment tools for the identification of students who are gifted.

School-based Administrators:

The Principal is responsible for ensuring the appropriate educational programming is in place for all students. To accommodate students identified as gifted, school-based administrators should actively promote gifted programming by ensuring that:

• Adequate identification processes are in place for all grades
• Opportunities for differentiated programming in the regular program are available based on the strengths and needs of the individual identified student
• Accommodations are documented in an IEP as directed by the Ministry

In additional to supporting classroom based interventions, school-based administrators may wish to consider enabling teachers to use a variety of strategies for students who are gifted including the following:

• Cluster grouping
• Subject acceleration
• Supplementary pull-out program

The Contact Teacher for Gifted Education

The responsibilities of the Contact Teacher include:

• Working collaboratively with classroom teachers to provide support for the design, supervision and assessment of educational programs for students identified as gifted
• Communicating with staff regarding the direction of gifted education
• Supporting the process of implementing district directions at the school level
• Participating as a member of the school-based team as required
• Coordinating the identification of students who are gifted at all grade levels
• Serving as case manager for documenting program modifications and development of IEPs
• Attending district sponsored initiatives related to gifted education

Classroom Teacher

Classroom teachers are responsible for supporting the variety of learning needs of their students including those identified as gifted. The responsibilities of classroom teachers include:

• Designing, supervising and assessing the educational program in collaboration with the Contact Teacher, the parents and the student
• Participating as a member of the school-based team when appropriate
• Participating in the development and implementation of the IEP

School-Based Team (SBT)

The school-based team is responsible for:

• Providing support through consultation on possible strategies for curriculum differentiation
• Providing opportunities for case management decisions and referrals

Parents

Parental involvement and support are key factors in the educational development of children. The responsibility of parents begins with a commitment to work in partnership with teachers in realizing the child’s potential. Teachers and parents must work cooperatively to ensure appropriate programming for students.

The Tools

The Greater Victoria School District’s identification process, at the elementary and middle school level, for students displaying aspects of giftedness involves getting input from several sources and a variety of evaluative tools. It is a Ministry of Education and Greater Victoria School District requirement that a Gifted designation be based upon more than a single evaluative tool.

At this time, the Greater Victoria School District uses the following evaluative tools:

1. A Student Survey – This is a one page checklist completed by the student candidate. The focus of this survey is to discover how the students will rate themselves on aspects of Creativity, Task Commitment, Fluency, Flexibility, Imagination, Complexity, Risk taking, Originality, Elaboration and Curiosity.
2. A Parent Survey – Like the Student Survey, this is a checklist which investigates the student’s Creativity, Task Commitment, Fluency, Flexibility, Imagination, Complexity, Risk taking, Originality, Elaboration and Curiosity. This is completed by a parent or guardian of the child. In addition to the checklist, this survey also permits parents to write in additional information about the child’s accomplishments.
3. A Teacher Survey – This survey is completed by the classroom teacher of the candidate student. This survey is a variation of the Williams Scale. It covers the following areas: Above Average Intelligence, Creativity, Task Commitment, Humour, Motivation, Interests, Expressiveness, Enquiry and Problem Solving.
4. The Otis-Lennon Test of Scholastic Ability - This is the Series 8 test which measures scholastic aptitude in such areas as Figural Reasoning, Deductive Reasoning, Pictoral Reasoning and Pattern Recognition.

It is the combination of a percentile ranking of 97 or higher on the Otis Lennon test along with supporting high levels in the various areas of the surveys which produces the designation of Gifted. The Greater Victoria School District has established this set of identification tools to be used as a universal identification process within this district.

HomeBound Support Services

Homebound Support is for students with medically fragile conditions whose absence from school is expected to be longer than 10 days. For long-term illnesses Homebound Teachers are hired for a maximum of 4 hours per week for Elementary, i.e. two afternoons, and a maximum of 6 hours per week for Secondary, i.e. three afternoons or two mornings. The homebound teacher carries out the program outlined by a school contact person. The contact person can be the homeroom teacher, the course teacher, counselor, administrator or any teacher designated by the principal. It is the responsibility of the contact person at the school to provide programming and materials needed for the homebound teacher and to continually monitor progress of the regularly assigned work. A close liaison with the Homebound teacher should be established by the school and continue throughout the Homebound program. If students are designated "Chronic Health" it is incumbent on the school to pay all costs incurred for the educational benefit of the homebound child.

Learning Support Services

Each school provides a range of services designed to support classroom teachers and their students. Students who have moderate to severe learning and/or adjustment difficulties are the recipients of Learning Support Services. Learning Support Services are provided by a teacher who is a member of the school-based team (SBT). This teacher commonly uses a consultative collaborative model to assist the classroom teacher with pre-referral intervention and with the implementation of support services for students designated as having special needs.

Learning Support Services include but are not limited to:

• Direct remedial, corrective, tutorial or skill-building instruction
• Adapted, modified or supplementary curriculum and materials
• Use of equipment, including computer and audiovisual technology
• Alternate instructional and/or evaluation strategies, including adjudicated provincial examinations
• Social skills training
• Learning strategies

Physiotherapy and Occupational Therapy Services

The therapists collaborate with families, educators and other service providers to support students who fall in Ministry Funding Categories. They offer consultation and assessment, teach specific skills and suggest adaptations to equipment and/or to the environment that will meet the needs of children with complex challenges. By offering therapeutic recommendations that support the student’s educational goals, teachers, parents and therapists assist the student in their ability to function in educational settings.

SET BC Services

SET-BC is a Provincial Resource Program designed to assist BC School Districts in meeting the technology needs of students with physical disabilities, visual impairments and autism.

School Counselling Services

School counsellors provide a continuum of preventative, developmental, remedial, and intervention services and programs and facilitate referral to community resources. The school counsellor's role includes counselling, school-based consultation, co-ordination and education. School counselling functions include individual, group and class work to provide both an intervention and a prevention service. The focus of school counselling is enhancing the students' development, assisting with the development of an enabling school culture and empowering students toward positive change. The counsellor:

• Promotes personal and social development appropriate to developmental stages
• Counsels students, their families and the community to foster growth in the students' self esteem, individual responsibility, and in skills such as decision making and social skills
• Ameliorates factors which may precipitate problems for students
• Enhances students' educational achievement through goal setting, assisting with the development of IEP's and activities such as promotion of effective work and study habits
• Provides appropriate interventions to assist students with school related problems and issues
• Facilitates the goals of career education by assisting students and their families to explore and clarify the student's career options, through developmental activities that stress decision-making, personal planning and career awareness.

School Psychology Services

School psychology provides assessment services to schools on a referral basis. The purpose is to support students, school personnel and parents in meeting the academic, social and adaptive needs of students through collaborative consultation. Psycho-educational assessments serve diagnostic and planning functions for students. Information may be used to assist with goal setting and selection of teaching and intervention strategies.

Speech Language Pathology Services

Speech-language pathology services are designed to support students whose educational and/or social progress is adversely affected by communication difficulties. The speech language pathology services may include a full range of services encompassing prevention, identification and assessment, direct instruction for students (individually, in classroom settings, or in small groups as appropriate), consultation, collaboration with other educators regarding the student's needs in the classroom and other school environments, in-service training, information sharing with families and other service providers and public education.

Teacher of the Deaf and Hard of Hearing

Service to Deaf or Hard of Hearing students is provided throughout the district. They provide support for these students in regular classrooms through direct instruction, assessment, consultation, liaison and assistance in modifying and adapting curriculum materials. This is addressed through an individual education plan. Service is on an itinerant basis in the following areas.

• Working with school teams to develop an IEP
• Performing classroom observations and assessments
• Providing information regarding hearing loss, implications and suggested strategies
• Providing in-service on hearing loss and related issues
• Teaching skills that are unique to students with hearing loss
  • For deaf students– Signing and all related skills
  • For hard of hearing students– ensure equipment is available
• Teaching self-advocacy skills for independent learning and thinking
• Keeping students abreast on current technologies
• Liaising with community agencies and support groups
• Assisting with program or school transitions
• Providing consultative services for students

Teacher of the Visually Impaired

Service to visually impaired students is provided throughout the district. The Vision Teacher works with students who are blind or whose visual acuity is 20/70 or less after the best possible correction. They provide support for these students in regular classrooms through direct instruction, assessment, consultation, liaison and assistance in modifying and adapting curriculum materials. This is addressed through an individual education plan. Service is on an itinerant basis in the following areas.

• Working with school teams to develop an IEP
• Performing classroom observations and assessments
• Providing information regarding vision loss, implications and suggested strategies
• Providing in-service on vision loss and related issues
• Teaching skills that are unique to students with vision loss
  • For students with no vision – Braille and all related skills
  • For student with low vision – ensure that all materials are in an appropriate print size
• Teaching self-advocacy skills for independent learning and thinking
• Keeping students abreast on current technologies
• Liaising with community agencies and support groups
• Assisting with program or school transitions
• Providing orientation and mobility services
• Providing consultative services for students with cortical vision impairment (CVI)

Transportation Services

The Greater Victoria School District provides transportation for:

• Regular bus service for students living in rural areas of the school district catchment.
• Students to District Low Incidence and Behaviour Programs.
• Low Incidence students unable to walk to their catchment school due to physical or mental disabilities.
• Exceptional Circumstances