TIME OUT AND PHYSICAL RESTRAINT DOS AND DONTS

TIME OUT AND PHYSICAL RESTRAINT: DOS AND DON’TS BEV JOHNS BEVERLEYHJOHNS@GMAIL. COM WWW. BEVJOHNS. COM

A brief history • Where Have We Been? • What Happened? • Where Are We Going.

It started with one parent, one student This Photo by Unknown Author is licensed under CC BY-SA-N

Started with guidelines • Peach color book • Green color book • Then legislation

The Legislation originally • Applied to all students • Required districts to have policies and procedures • Required schools to designate an individual • Required schools to keep incident reports • Did allow locked time out • Stated that people had to be trained every two years

Pro-Publica Illinois report and Chicago Tribune—released in November 2019 • Documents showed more than 20, 000 incidents of seclusion from 2017 -2018 and through early December, 2018. In a third of incidents there was no safety reason for seclusion. • Black Hawk Special Ed. --850 seclusions during the time. • Lincoln Way Area Special Ed— 42% of timeouts did not have a safety concern. • Kansas Treatment and Learning Center—documented nearly 1100 isolated timeouts in 15 months. • Special Ed. District of Lake County— 1200 times over 15 months

Response to investigation • November 20—ISBE took emergency action to end isolated seclusion, • Governor Pritzker launched an investigation

Current Rules—adopted by ISBE, as sent to JCAR • The proposed rules make the following changes to Part 1: Bans all isolated seclusion practices; Time out shall be utilized only when the student’s behavior presents an imminent danger of serious physical harm to the student or others and other less restrictive and intrusive measures have been tried and proven ineffective in stopping the imminent danger of serious physical harm; If time out is utilized, a trained adult must be in the room with the student; Any space used for time out shall remain unlocked; Bans physical restraints that could impair a student’s ability to breathe or speak normally, and institutes strict parameters on when physical restraint is allowed; Requires educational entities to submit data to ISBE within 48 hours of any instance of physical restraint or time out; Requires educational entities to document the use of time out and physical restraint on a form created by the State Superintendent. Such form must also be sent to the parents of a student within 24 hours of the time out or physical restraint; Eliminates the option for parents or guardians to waive notification of instances of time out or physical restraint; Creates a complaint procedure for individuals to file complaints related to the use of time out and physical restraint.

. Then ISBE proposed permanent rules. JCAR received comments by early February. In April, the proposed rules were approved with 1 change – they restored prone restraints at the request of some private schools for a period of 1 year. The ISBE rules are in effect now, but would have to be modified if contradictory legislation passes.

The Illinois State Board of Education (ISBE) on March 6 released a Request for Sealed Proposals for the Special Education Behavior Assessment and Training Project Grant. The three-year, $7. 5 million grant will engage an entity in providing professional development and assistance to districts to implement safe and student-centered behavioral interventions. The selected awardee will help districts address students' behavioral needs in compliance with the recent changes to Illinois' rules restricting the use of time out and physical restraint.

House Bill 3975 • House Bill 3975—Carroll. Amends the School Code. Prohibits a school district employee or volunteer or an independent contractor of a school district from placing a student in seclusion; defines seclusion. Provides that this prohibition does not apply to the use of seclusion in a courtordered placement, other than a placement in an educational program of a school district, or in a placement or facility to which other laws or rules apply. Requires State Board of Education rulemaking. Effective immediately. House Mental Health Committee.

• Senate Bill 2315—Gillespie. Amends the School Code. Prohibits a school district employee or volunteer or an independent contractor of a school district from placing a student in seclusion; defines seclusion. Provides that this prohibition does not apply to the use of seclusion in a court-ordered placement, other than a placement in an educational program of a school district, or in a placement or facility to which other laws or rules apply. Requires State Board of Education rulemaking. Effective immediately. Senate Education. Senate Bill 2315

Senate Bill 2323—Koehler. Amends the Children with Disabilities Article of the School Code. Removes obsolete language in provisions concerning behavioral interventions for students with disabilities who require behavioral intervention. Makes changes concerning a school board's policies and procedures on the use of behavioral interventions, including requirements related to the use of time outs and physical restraint. Allows for complaints to be filed with the State Superintendent of Education. Effective immediately. Senate Education. • Senate Bill 2323

What Needs to Happen Now • Training, training, on preventive and positive practices. • Monitoring of who is doing time out and physical restraint • Technical assistance and monitoring with consequences • Continual look at data • Reflection at the end of every day

Consider: • The definition of timeout—it is not punishment, short removal of all chance of positive reinforcement • Timeout and reinforcement • Zero in on specific behaviors and analyze those behaviors • Don’t cut corners on comprehensive evaluations • Medical issues • Consider the impact of trauma and anxiety

Parents and Educators • Teach children how to behave • Reinforce them for behaving—never take good behavior for granted, reinforce it • Reinforce successive approximations • Provide logical consequences that teach • Ask the why • Reflect

What is Unit 5 doing?