Kids in Chaos
Ray Culberson, Director, San Bernardino City USD Office, CA

Growing numbers of children come to school from an environment of crime and neglect, often suffering from depression, anxiety, conduct disorder, ADHD, and a host of other emotionally charged issues. In this unique in-depth session, you will learn strategies for handling difficult students, as well as learning techniques for maintaining your own personal sanity as you try to effectively engage these families.

Strand: Engaging At-Risk Students
Grade Level: K–12

Stemming the Tide: Helping At-Risk Kids Stay in School
Kate Bishop, CWA Coordinator/CSS Field Colleague, North Sacramento District Office; Patrick Yrarrázaval-Correa, Principal, Carr Intermediate School, CA

Impoverished schools frequently struggle to keep students interested in and attending school. Many factors get in the way of students graduating and becoming successful adults. Solving the truancy issue at your school is not simple and requires a school wide effort. Session leaders will present their real-world strategies for getting kids excited in school, and offering the supports and limits needed to increase attendance and school success. Learn about effective interventions at the elementary and secondary levels for helping students experiencing family chaos, homelessness and school failure.

Strand: Engaging At-Risk Students
Grade Level: K–12

Improve Motor Skills—Accelerate Progress for ADHD and Other Learners
Cindy Roth Pahr, M.Ed., Founder, EduClime, CA

Many ADHD students with motor difficulties are misunderstood, resulting in negative school experiences and failure. Learn fun, effective strategies to help students with fine motor, gross motor, visual tracking, and sensory skills. You can employ these strategies on Monday morning and have a repertoire of ideas to share with teachers who need assistance with students in these areas. Handwriting emphasized.

Strand: Engaging At-Risk Students
Grade Level: K–6

Welcoming Diversity in Our Schools: Acknowledging and Supporting Students of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Parents
Arielle Rosen, Family Services Manager, LA Gay & Lesbian Center; Jen Durham, Family Advocate, CA

This interactive workshop will address the unique issues facing students with lesbian, gay, bisexual, and/or transgender (LGBT) parents, outline specific strategies and best practices for creating safe and welcoming classrooms and schools for all students, and provide space for educators and parents to explore their own fears, challenges, and concerns about incorporating LGBT families into existing diversity curriculum.

Strand: NEW!, Engaging At-Risk Students
Grade Level: K–12

You Can’t Make Me! Managing the Oppositional Defiant Student
Ernest Mendes, Consultant/President, Mendes Training & Consulting, Inc., CA

This interactive session will help you better understand the oppositionally defiant student. ODD will be addressed in the context of the emotional intelligence competencies required on the part of the adult to manage ODD in the classroom. Teachers will learn to flow with resistance through a specific set of environmental and interpersonal strategies designed to reduce defiance in the ODD child.

Strand: Engaging At-Risk Students
Grade Level: K–12

Kids in Chaos
Ray Culberson, Director, San Bernardino City USD Office, CA

Growing numbers of children come to school from an environment of crime and neglect, often suffering from depression, anxiety, conduct disorder, ADHD, and a host of other emotionally charged issues. In this session, you will learn strategies for handling difficult students, as well as learning techniques for maintaining your own personal sanity as you try to effectively engage these families.

Strand: Engaging At-Risk Students
Grade Level: K–12

On Playing a Poor Hand Well: How to Identify and Amplify Sources of Resilience in Struggling Youth
Mark Katz, Learning Development Services, CA

Participants will gain an increased understanding of practices that foster resiliency and a sense of mastery in children, youth, and families enduring the effects of multiple risk exposure. We will also identify evidence-based programs and practices that positively alter the social climate of a school and can lead to a reduction in aggressive and violent behavior campus-wide.

Strand: Engaging At-Risk Students
Grade Level: K–12

Using the SST Process to Effectively Address Behavior Problems
Jim Anderson, Intervention & Team Coordinator, Health & Human Services; Susan Morris, Behavior Specialist, Los Angeles USD, CA

This educational and interactive session will use Geoff Colvin’s seven-phase model for describing acting-out behavior, incorporate proactive strategies for each of the seven phases, and teach how the SST process can support teachers, administrators, and students with challenging behaviors. Participants will have fun while learning effective methods through sharing and a variety of activities.

Strand: NEW!, Engaging At-Risk Students
Grade Level: K–12

I Get it! Lessons in Comprehension
Patrice Stanzione, Teacher SDC/SLD, Nelson Elementary School, Hacienda La Puente USD, CA

One key to opening the doors of academic success is the knowledge of words. Increase vocabulary, increase comprehension, increase academic success. Whether your student is designated ELL, SPED, or “at risk,” chances are high that they are vocabulary-limited. Learn simple ways to let words, their meanings, and their relationships to other words empower your students’ lives.

Strand: NEW!, Engaging At-Risk Students
Grade Level: K–6

Inclusive Interactive Teaching Strategies
Vicki Butler, Coordinator/CSS Field Colleague, Corona-Norco Special Education, Corona-Norco USD; Andrew Stetkevich, Staff Development Specialist/CSS Field Colleague, Riverside Staff Development Center, Riverside USD, CA

This presentation will focus on best practices for meeting the needs of ALL students in order to bring up underperforming subgroups. Strategies for slower learners, second language learners, special education students, children of poverty, and other children who learn differently will be demonstrated and shared along with interactive teaching techniques.

Strand: Engaging At-Risk Students
Grade Level: K–12

Rebels with Applause: Succeeding with Difficult Students
Grace Dearborn, Educational Consultant, Conscious Teaching, LLC, CA

This lively session will provide K-12 teachers with practical strategies for working with tough students, both in behavior and participation. Strategies for individual students as well as classroom wide strategies will be shared. Leave with your tool kit overflowing with stuff you can use.

Strand: Engaging At-Risk Students
Grade Level: K–12

Temperament, Learning Style & the At-Risk Learner
Vicki Phillips, M.Ed., Director, Personal Development, CA

At-risk students tend to have a distinct temperament and learning style. In this highly interactive session, discover which of the four major personality temperaments is most like you, which tends to dominate mainstream education, and which is typical of most at-risk students. Discover how to narrow the gap between you and your at-risk population.

Strand: Engaging At-Risk Students
Grade Level: K–12

Building Respect, Responsibility, and Resiliency in At-Risk Adolescents
Vicki Phillips, M.Ed., Director, Personal Development, CA

Learn how to teach students who “don’t want to be told what to do” to want to be responsible and respectful, by using their need to feel “powerful” as the foundation for developing character, resiliency, and emotional intelligence. Vicki Phillips will share the philosophy from her one-semester curriculum, Personal Development, purchased by over 1450 secondary schools.

Strand: Engaging At-Risk Students
Grade Level: 7–12

The Kids Left Behind: Intervene Successfully with Underachieving Children
William Parrett, Director, Center for School Improvement & Policy Studies, Boise State University; Dr. Robert Barr, Speaker and Author, ID

Specific topics will include improvements in leadership, curriculum, instruction, assessment and data literacy, reorganization of time, space, and transitions, understanding poverty, targeting interventions, and parent and community engagement. This session will provide participants with the opportunity to compare the work of high-achieving schools with their own efforts and to build action plans.

Strand: Engaging At-Risk Students
Grade Level: K–12

A New Framework for Understanding ADHD: Power Tools for Nontraditional Learners
Frank Kros, MSW, JD, Executive Vice President, The Children’s Guild, MD

Based on the latest research, 14 practical strategies are provided to enhance the effectiveness of your teaching, improve the quality of your therapeutic interventions, and strengthen your helping relationship with ADHD students. Highly interactive, this “learn and do” workshop incorporates brain scans, film, music, art, manipulatives, and movement to transform your thinking about and boost your skills with ADHD students.

Strand: NEW!, Engaging At-Risk Students
Grade Level: K–12

The Power of Video to Open Minds and Hearts: Using Gay Youthto Educate Your Faculty
Pam Walton, Producer/Director/Former H.S. Teacher, Pam Walton Productions, CA

This workshop will present the groundbreaking film Gay Youth. The film can sensitize faculty to an issue that is too often ignored. This workshop will include specific strategies for reaching out to students, parents, and administrators, as well as time for attendees to share their experiences. Gay Youthand study guide will be available for purchase.

Strand: Engaging At-Risk Students
Grade Level: 7–12

Empowering Discipline: An Approach that Works with At-Risk Students
Vicki Phillips, M.Ed., Director Personal Development, CA

Most school discipline plans are based on the need to control student behavior. With those at-risk youths who see no future and feel they have nothing to lose, “control” becomes counterproductive, and they spiral downhill. Learn how to handle disciplinary situations with those students who “do not want to be told what to do.”

Strand: Engaging At-Risk Students
Grade Level: 7–12

Improving AYP Special Ed Subgroup
Jim Huckeba, Ph.D., Director, Special Services, Hesperia USD Office, CA

For the past eight years, Hesperia USD has seen a dramatic decrease in the number of students being identified as special education students, while seeing improved academic achievement for all students. In this workshop, learn to apply an RTI model in which all students are evaluated and research-based strategies are used to address the needs of all students.

Strand: Engaging At-Risk Students
Grade Level: K–12

Reading by the Colors
Patricia Rennick, MA, Resource Specialist, Anaheim CSD Office; Helen Irlen, MA, LMFT, Executive Director, Irlen Institute, CA

Learn to identify processing deficits that may affect 25% of the regular school population and 50% of those with learning and reading problems. What can be done to help? Learn how Anaheim City Schools District improved STAR test scores by 25%. In this seminar, you will learn how to identify, remediate, and, in some cases, change a person’s life!

Strand: Marketing Session, Engaging At-Risk Students
Grade Level: K–12

The Joel Bridgman Mentor Program
Gayle Green, Julie Marion, Resource Specialists; Sheri Graves, Oakdale Elementary School, Rio Linda Union ESD, CA

This workshop includes a multimedia presentation that highlights how to set up a successful mentor program at your school. This mentoring program is highly successful in the K–6 setting, but may be adapted to fit any school setting. Mentoring strategies will be discussed, as well as the nuts and bolts of setting up your own mentor program.

Strand: NEW!, Engaging At-Risk Students
Grade Level: K–6

The Ninth Grade Academy: A Model
Intervention Program for Dropout Prevention Mari Bordona, Principal/K–12 Alt. Programs; Rebecca Tourtellotte, Assistant Principal/K–12 Alt. Programs, Azusa USD, CA

The ninth grade academy has been designed to prevent dropout by giving academically at-risk students specialized attention in a small, caring learning environment during their ninth grade year. This session will provide an overview of a model program, complete with handouts of the academy’s policies and data to support its effectiveness.

Strand: Engaging At-Risk Students
Grade Levels: 9–12