The following will help inform you about the candidates for the Arlington School Board for the Nov. 8th general election. Two candidates, Bethany Sutton and Dr. James “Vell” Rives, are running for the seat now held by School Board Past Chair Dr. Barbara Kanninen, who is not seeking re-election.
Please note that Arlington SEPTA is a non-partisan organization and does not endorse specific candidates or political parties. For more information, please see vote.arlingtonva.gov
2022 School Board Candidate SEPTA Questionnaire
Each year Arlington SEPTA asks each School Board candidate the same set of questions and shares their unedited answers for your information. Please note that candidates were asked to return their responses by October 10th, so some answers may be based on information that has since changed.
Scroll down to each question below to view responses from each candidate. Or click below to see the full set of each candidate’s responses here:
Bethany Sutton’s SEPTA Questionnaire Response
Dr. James “Vell” Rives’ SEPTA Questionnaire Response
Question 1: Describe your experience working with or on behalf of individuals with disabilities.
Question 2: What do you believe to be the most significant issues or challenges within APS relating to students with disabilities?
Question 3: What steps should APS take to improve the identification, education, overall welfare, of students with disabilities in APS?
Question 4: What are two concrete ways that APS can improve inclusion of students with disabilities and implement universal design for learning?
Question 5: What is your knowledge and opinion of the accessibility issues in APS facilities and what recommendations do you have to remedy this?
Question 6: How familiar are you with APS’ 2019 Program Evaluation for Students with Disabilities and those Receiving Interventions? How will you ensure that commitments to the recommendations made in this evaluation move forward as planned?
Question 7: What strategies should APS use to ensure sufficient, high quality, diverse Special Education teachers and training for General Education teachers on the instruction of students with disabilities?
Question 8: How should APS retain our related service providers (which include but not limited to Audiologists, Augmentative and Alternative Communication (AAC) Specialists, Occupational Therapists, Physical Therapists, Speech Language Pathologists, Teachers of the Visually Impaired, ASL & Cue Interpreters, and Behavior Specialists) and fill its vacant positions given the national labor shortage and the high rate of APS declined offers?
Question 9: How will you engage with the special education community and/or SEPTA if you are elected?
School Board Candidate Questionnaire Responses by Question
Q1. Describe your experience working with or on behalf of individuals with disabilities.
SUTTON- As a parent, I have experienced the IEP and 504 process at all levels (ES, MS, HS). As a PTA president and board member at a Title I elementary school, I developed a high level of familiarity with the experiences of families of students with disabilities and was occasionally able to assist other parents (especially those from our immigrant community) with accessing resources. As a representative, vice chair, and now chair of ACTL, I have made a conscious effort to be attentive to the needs of students with disabilities, to listen to the experiences of parents in navigating the system, and to think about how students with disabilities are experiencing the academic landscape within APS. In 2021-22, as chair of ACTL, I was invited to attend meetings held with SEPTA representatives and administrative leadership/staff to address issues for students with disabilities in the VLP. I made it a point to attend those meetings and listened closely to the conversation. (I offered a few suggestions to be supportive but generally reserved my participation as there were others in the room experiencing the issues directly and their voices were the most important ones to be heard in that space.)
RIVES- In high school I served as a regular sitter for several intellectually disabled adults during church services, and one summer I was employed as the head counselor for intellectually disabled adults attending a day camp.
As a psychiatrist, many of my patients have mental and emotional disabilities requiring accommodations in their employment. My adolescent patients often have IEP’s, 504 plans, and sometimes disciplinary problems that may originate from their illness or disability.
My interactions with employers and schools involve a lot of documentation but, disappointingly, little actual conversation about my patients to exchange ideas and concerns that don’t fit within the paperwork. In both the private and public sectors, regulations and bureaucracy choke out the personal element of disability work. Too often, even basic human decency seems missing.
Q2. What do you believe to be the most significant issues or challenges within APS relating to students with disabilities?
SUTTON● Students with disabilities are not experiencing the same educational outcomes as other students. (See Equity Dashboard)
For example: the overall 2021-22 SOL pass rate in English Reading for APS students was 80%; for students with disabilities, the pass rate was 52%.
- Students with disabilities have very different experiences of APS depending on which school they attend; there is a high level of inconsistency across the system in how their needs are met. (See 2019 Program Evaluation, esp theme #3, page 203)
- Students with disabilities may experience higher levels of emotional distress, anxiety, mental health issues, and social emotional developmental issues. (See Your Voice Matters survey, 2022)
For example: “students in special education programs respond 7 points above the district average on Student Well-Being: Trust Adult at School. They report at or below average across all other topics. (emphasis added)”
RIVES- Hiring and retaining sufficient, excellent staff; and maintaining consistent quality of services from school to school. The bureaucracy of special education services, well-intended to ensure fairness and scrutiny, has become a burden: families may be overwhelmed, and staff can become defensive and self-protective.
Q3. What steps should APS take to improve the identification, education, overall welfare, of students with disabilities in APS?
SUTTON- We should flip our thinking so that we are putting first the students who have the greatest needs, rather than beginning with the “traditional” student and then asking how other students will fare. So – for example, if we are redesigning some element of transportation services, we could begin with designing the change for students with disabilities first and then move on to the larger population of students. This is a culture shift that may not be easy but would benefit all students, since often what will work best for students with disabilities will serve everyone well.
Another important element of culture that will support students with disabilities is a strong commitment to training and empowering staff to understand and initiate early identification. In my own experience as a parent, a teacher noticed behavioral issues that were an indicator of ADHD. That moment of noticing needs to routinely translate into investigating whether anything might merit further exploration. Professional development should be a critical area of focus for APS.
As another example, when we think about dyslexia, research says early signs can be present as young as 1-2 years of age. When APS first interacts with students in Pre-K or Kindergarten, we can include in early student progress observations whether the student is speaking like a younger child, using words inconsistent with their meaning, or showing differences with their peers in rhyming and following directions. Equipping staff to understand and recognize that 1 in 5 students may have some level of dyslexia can help APS identify and assess needs associated with dyslexia.
https://www.understood.org/en/articles/dyslexia-in-preschool-4-signs-you-might-see)
We also should focus on the importance of early assessment for English language learners. It can be more difficult for a classroom teacher to detect and understand whether differences in participation and schoolwork are attributable to language acquisition or a disability. For example, some of our newest students in APS may have had fewer opportunities locally or in another community to identify hearing or vision impairment. It may well be reasonable and necessary to invest in additional supports & resources for these students.
In short, I believe APS should promote a systemic culture that centers students with disabilities in a more deliberate manner, that has a strong focus on meaningful professional development for teachers, and is attentive to the nuanced needs of students and areas of potential learning differences.
RIVES- Every student should be presumed competent with general education placement being the default as well as the ideal. This does place especially high importance on identifying the students who do need special services or accommodations.
Screening processes need to be simplified and streamlined. It will serve us better to have screening protocols that all teachers can use consistently rather than to have screening protocols that are so complex or burdensome that they end up being used in a cursory way or avoided altogether. Another pitfall is gathering too much information, i.e., more data than can be analyzed or acted upon due to staff limitations.
An effective solution in medical settings may well be applied here; that is to administer simple, highly sensitive screening tools to all students followed by more thorough, specific tools only on those who are captured by initial screening or referred by staff or others. Staff must advocate for individual students whose families have difficulty accessing services or navigating the system.
We should also identify students who might only need services temporarily, and we should strive to have as many students as appropriate exit the Special Education system, that is, achieve independence in a General Education setting.
Please see my responses to questions 4-7 for further thoughts on this question.
Q4. What are two concrete ways that APS can improve inclusion of students with disabilities and implement universal design for learning?
SUTTON- APS should follow the recommendation of the Arlington Special Education Advisory Committee to review progress toward the inclusion goal of 80% by the end of 2024 and the planning factors associated with the needed staffing to achieve that goal. The Superintendent has begun a process for this review, and the School Board should closely monitor progress and take the appropriate steps to make budget adjustments, over time, that will yield more substantial results.
The focus of universal design for learning is to ensure that all students can access and participate in meaningful, challenging learning opportunities (CAST, Inc. 2018). I believe that a substantial component of this lies within engaging students in their learning. Students need to feel a sense of community; have choices; the content needs to be relevant for them; and they need to have environments that are conducive to their learning. This is a reason why I have a strong interest in things like outdoor learning, project-based learning, community-based learning, etc. But these kinds of opportunities need to be embedded within the curriculum and available for all students at all schools – not in a disparate manner in which individual schools develop boutique programs. A critical element is using evidence-based practices to build students’ engagement in their learning.
RIVES- Teaching staff will need to be available to facilitate inclusion of students in the classroom as well as in unstructured activities like recess and lunch and in athletics and performing arts. Multiple students may need to be pooled with one staff member at various times, but care must be taken not to have the effect of segregating those students. We must make it a budget priority to employ adequate support staff to assist classroom teachers.
I support a combination of universal design methods and traditional “mainstreaming” practices. As with good general education, teachers should present and reinforce material in a variety of formats. Ideally, every student will master the full range of academic skills.
Full academic inclusion can mean that a student will perform better via some modes of learning than others, and development should be encouraged in areas of weakness. In more extreme situations, when a certain mode of learning or demonstrating mastery is significantly impaired or not applicable, a formal accommodation should be applied individually.
Q5. What is your knowledge of and opinion of the accessibility issues in APS facilities and what recommendations do you have to remedy this?
SUTTON- Like many districts, we have a wide array of older and newer facilities and disparate accessibility across our system.
Planning is a critical factor here. Fleet required post-construction recovery because of a failure to plan for an accessible parking lot. The Shriver program relocated and resumed operating without accessible bus and car pick-up/drop-off. These examples provide stark evidence that if high-scrutiny physical accessibility needs can be overlooked, individualized learning, educational, and less-visible physical accessibility issues also can be neglected. (Relatedly – staffing for SPED positions, while not directly related to accessibility in facilities, represents an area of concern since that is an equally critical factor in supporting students with disabilities.)
As stated earlier, a remedy is to plan for students with disabilities first, rather than as an afterthought. If we privilege the physical accessibility, the environment for learning, the unique qualities & characteristics of our students, we will plan facilities that will work for all students. This applies both to new buildings but also, more critically, to projects coming down the pipeline to improve kitchens and security vestibules, plan outdoor spaces, and engage in general renovations and upgrades.
RIVES- I know there is wide variation in accessibility between newer and older facilities, and that there have been shortcomings with new facilities which have been expensive to correct. Obviously, new construction must comply with code, but that is only a minimum starting point for accessibility.
As for improving the accessibility of existing, grandfathered facilities, I want to make upgrades and maintenance a budget priority, and I would like to see the timeline for planned upgrades accelerated. I am aware this is harder to promote than exciting new projects, but I aim to give it the attention it deserves. As with many special education issues, improvement here will benefit all APS students and staff.
Q6. How familiar are you with APS’ 2019 Program Evaluation for Students with Disabilities and those Receiving Interventions? How will you ensure that commitments to the recommendations made in this evaluation move forward as planned?
SUTTON- I’m familiar with the 2019 Program Evaluation at a high level and aware of some of the key recommendations/findings from that report. Given the disruption of the pandemic and new leadership since the study was done in 2018-19, I think it would be valuable for APS to do a comprehensive status update—perhaps going beyond the typical annual update—that recalibrates where we are now in relation to the recommendations.
APS needs to ensure that each school & program across the system is providing a school-wide approach to student support, with teachers, administrators, counselors, psychologists, and other specialists working as a team to assess students and plan interventions. We need a focus on professional development for teachers that, at a minimum, builds familiarity and facility with the Multi-tiered System of Supports. We also need to address school climate with leadership development for administrators that focuses on integrating solutions for students’ academic, behavioral, social, and emotional needs and provides meaningful engagement with families in support of student achievement.
Finally, it’s critical to maintain a strong focus on evidence-based strategies at every tier of support for students.
RIVES- I have read the evaluation, and I expect the Superintendent, Chief Academic Officer, and Special Education Directors to take the recommendations under advisement seriously and report regularly to the Board on these areas of attention. The administration should be in ongoing dialogue with ASEAC, who in turn should be providing regular feedback.
As these recommendations are made by private consultants, the Board should allow the Superintendent and his staff some flexibility over how to prioritize these recommendations. For example, inconsistency from site to site might be more quickly and effectively addressed through better staff recruitment and training rather than further centralization of special education services. In addition to refinement of planning factor analyses, equity of services might be better achieved when resource allocation follows identified students as they move from school to school or in and out of the system – a combination of proactive and reactive approaches.
Q7. What strategies should APS use to ensure sufficient high quality, diverse Special Education teachers and training for General Education teachers on the instruction of students with disabilities?
SUTTON- First, the recommendations from the 2019 Evaluation related to Professional Learning should be fully implemented to ensure that teachers are well-versed on the instruction of students with disabilities, inclusive practices, using data, identifying and referring students, etc.
Second, I would recommend a peer-mentoring program as a retention strategy in which Special Ed teachers have designated affinity groups—across schools—to provide support, colleagueship, information-sharing, and a sense of community. This is especially important to build retention for teaching and Special Ed assistants and teachers of color who may not feel a strong sense of community within their individual schools but who might appreciate and find value in a cross-school affinity group within which they could build a professional support network.
I am certain that there are many other potential strategies – I would welcome the perspective of teachers on what would be compelling for them to take Special Ed positions and remain in them. And similarly, it’s important to engage with general education teachers to understand their needs and what would help them be successful in working with students with disabilities.
RIVES- APS should hire dually certified general/special education teachers whenever possible.
Retaining our current teachers is not just a matter of higher pay, but also about reducing the administrative burden on teachers. Staff configuration should aim to have a few staff who know a student well rather than larger layers of staff who have limited interaction with each student. Because Special Education services must be so highly customized, the best strategic choices will likely be made by those teachers working most closely with a student.
General education and special education teachers need common planning time to collaborate, especially in settings where co-teaching is not standard practice.
Professional development (continuing education) for General Education teachers should require Special Education topics both for overall review as well as learning developments in best practices.
Q8. How should APS retain our related service providers (which include but not limited to Audiologists, Augmentative and Alternative Communication (AAC) Specialists, Occupational Therapists, Physical Therapists, Speech Language Pathologists, Teachers of the Visually Impaired, ASL & Cue Interpreters, and Behavior Specialists) and fill its vacant positions given the national labor shortage and the high rate of APS declined offers?
SUTTON- As we’ve all heard, school districts across the country, especially those in rural areas, are facing a variety of recruiting and retention challenges in the wake of the pandemic. In Arlington, of course, we have a high cost of living and competitive job market with many different employment opportunities. I would like to know more from the types of professionals mentioned to know why APS’s offers may not be appealing and would like also to know more about the other factors at play in the labor market for individuals with these skills and for these kinds of positions. Generally, I am open to supporting increased pay and benefits as one way to address recruitment and retention problems, but that’s rarely the only solution, especially now as the pandemic has inspired many people to reevaluate their careers.
Longer term, we need to build a pipeline for a whole host of education positions, and while I’m aware APS is working with a variety of colleges and universities to build a deeper pool of candidates for teaching positions, it may be necessary to have a concerted effort related to more specialized positions as well.
RIVES- I want to make student-facing staff positions a budgeting priority for both General and Special Education. I am open to creative policy changes to attract and retain the specialists we need in Special Education, such as offering new hires in under-supplied fields generous annual bonuses in exchange for tenure eligibility.
Q9. How will you engage with the special education community and/or SEPTA if you are elected?
SUTTON- I will continue to follow SEPTA and ASEAC’s concerns and interests and would welcome the opportunity to serve as the School Board liaison to ASEAC. It is a personal goal to be a School Board member who is accessible and engaged in the community. And It is critical that the special education community is at the table across APS because there is no area in which the special ed community doesn’t have an important role to play in informing, advocating, and holding APS accountable.
With the range of special education issues students and their families confront, I am always looking to learn more about how we can best serve all students in our schools. I hope I have conveyed the fundamental educational philosophy that I hold – that serving our diverse learners will serve all students.
RIVES- During this campaign, I have learned so much about the range of special education experiences in Arlington speaking with families and students, and I want to continue these conversations as a Board member. I would be happy to serve as the Board liaison to ASEAC. I will respond to all communications from ASEAC and SEPTA, and I will support administrative and/or Board action if there is breakdown in process or communication.
My interest in Special Education and disability is inevitably informed by my personal experiences. But much more importantly, I want to understand the full range of experiences in Arlington County, and I will continue listening and learning. I respectfully ask that voters grant me this opportunity and entrust me with this work.
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