Sept 19, 2022, VT Digger: In one Vermont school district, the practice of physically restraining students has drawn scrutiny https://vtdigger.org/2022/09/19/in-one-vermont-school-district-the-practice-of-physically-restraining-students-has-drawn-scrutiny/
When he was in sixth grade, Ember Power’s son began to act out in school.
Power’s son, whose name she declined to share, was exhibiting signs of slow processing speed, meaning he struggled to keep up in classes at Crossett Brook Middle School in Duxbury. Class was often overwhelming and stressful for him, and he sometimes refused to do work, or simply walked out of his classroom.
After his behavior interventionist left partway through the school year, Power’s son was sometimes left in the care of another staffer. One day, while being supervised in the staffer’s office, her son attempted to leave the room. The school employee “didn’t allow him out,” Power said. “And then when he tried to leave, she held him down.”
What her son experienced is known in education jargon as a prone restraint: a practice, intended as a safety measure, in which a student is physically held face-down on the ground.
Prone restraints, though strictly limited by state rules, are permitted in Vermont. But in Harwood Union Unified School District, which includes Crossett Brook, their use has drawn public scrutiny and criticism for months — culminating in a temporary halt to the practice.
In an Aug. 25 letter, signed by the district’s superintendent and the school board’s chair and vice chair, administrators announced that they were appointing a task force to examine the district’s use of prone restraints and implementing a moratorium, “effective immediately.”…
Restraints and seclusions are an accepted practice in schools, although they are supposed to be rare. Under federal guidelines, “restraint or seclusion should never be used except in situations where a child’s behavior poses imminent danger of serious physical harm to self or others.” The practices “should be avoided to the greatest extent possible without endangering the safety of students and staff.”
But prone restraints, like the one that Power’s son suffered, are more strictly regulated. According to Guy Stephens, the founder of Maryland-based nonprofit Alliance Against Seclusion and Restraint, more than 30 states have outlawed prone restraints in their schools. Vermont is not among them.
“Honestly, I'm a little surprised that Vermont's state law still allows the use of prone restraint,” Stephens said in an interview. “That was a little bit shocking to me.”
In Vermont, prone and supine (face-up) restraints are supposed to be used as an absolute last resort — permitted by the Agency of Education only when a student’s “size and severity of behavior” require it, and only if “less restrictive” measures would fail to prevent harm.
Restraints, especially prone restraints, can be physically dangerous. And data shows that students of color and students with disabilities are more likely to be physically restrained or put in seclusion, Stephens said. …
According to the most recent publicly available data on restraints from the federal Department of Education, from the 2017-18 school year, Harwood Union Unified School District recorded a total of 451 restraints — the most of any district in the state. That year, 281 reported instances of restraint were reported at Brookside Primary School, then called Thatcher Brook.
It’s not clear from that data how many of those were prone restraints. All were used on students with disabilities.
Michael Leichliter, who took over as the district’s new superintendent this July, said in an interview that he did not know why the school and district had recorded such high numbers, but noted that the practice had decreased since then.
“I was not here. I don't know the students involved,” he said. “But in general, it's a very, very small number of students that are impacted by the use of restraints in the schools. And we have seen a decline from that school year.”
Brookside reported 192 restraints in the 2020-21 school year, and 157 in the 2021-22 year, Leichliter said….
Brigid Nease, the district’s superintendent at the time, urged the board to consult an attorney and conduct more research into the practice. A new superintendent was scheduled to take over July 1, and, she said, it was unclear whether the board had the authority to end prone restraints in the school. …
Leichliter said that enacting new policies on restraints and seclusions “requires a lot of conversations and thoughtful consideration, especially in cases where we have students who really need and who have trouble with that regulation.”
But the superintendent, a former administrator in Pennsylvania, noted that his prior home state did not permit prone restraints in schools. ….
It’s unclear whether other Vermont school districts have taken steps to limit the practice. Education officials and disability advocates said they were unaware of any other districts with restrictions on restraints beyond those mandated by state rules. …
“The ideal is that we're meeting kids’ needs so that no restraint is ever really appropriate, because students never get to the place of being an actual danger to themselves or other people,” she said. “We're not there yet. But I do think restraints and seclusion are overused, and in particular are overused and targeted (toward) students with disabilities.”
The campaign in Harwood Union has drawn the attention of at least one state lawmaker. Rep. Theresa Wood, D-Waterbury, said that she is working with other lawmakers to draft legislation addressing the practice.
That bill is based on the Keeping All Students Safe Act, a proposed federal law that would ban prone and supine restraints nationwide.
Vermont lawmakers have tried and failed to ban prone restraints in the past. But, Wood said, “The world has changed in the last 20 years.”
“I'm hopeful,” she said. “Let's just put it that way. I'm hopeful that we will have more support as we look at this issue.” …
Principal Tom Drake holds the door open for a student at Crossett Brook Middle School in Duxbury on Friday, Sept. 16. Photo by Glenn Russell/VTDigger