Manteca Unified may soon step up counseling services at the elementary school level.
At Tuesday’s school board meetings, Cheryl Meeker, who is the senior director of the Elementary Education, along with Shasta School Principal Audrey Greene and Brock Elliott School Principal Debbie Ruger unveiled several possible models.
Included was one patterned after the one used at the Ceres Unified School District.
According to Greene, one full-time student support specialist would be placed at each of the K-8 sites under the Ceres Unified Counseling Service Model, which would also call for hiring five full-time prevention counselors with Pupil Personnel Services credentials and one Mental Health-certified school psychologist serving as a coordinator and trainer.
The estimated cost is $1.5 million.
The district has discussed the possibilities of enhancing counseling services at the elementary sites at previous school board meetings.
In October, a committee made up of MUSD Director of Student Services / Special Education Roger Goatcher,  board member Kathy Howe, Meeker and several principals including Greene and Ruger, to name a few, was formed.
The purpose of the group was to develop a board presentation consisting of three models, Meeker said.
“It’s called preventative counseling – helping (a young student’s problem) now before it becomes a serious problem,” Howe added on the reason expanding the services.
Each of the models had its shares of pros and cons.
The Ceres model, for example, would not only mean additional cost to the district but could also interrupt the current service model in order to implement the new one. The student support service specialist would only be required to have bachelor’s degree and no counseling degree – he or she, in this case, would had to be overseen by someone who is licensed in mental health.
As for the pros, the Ceres model would provide more control at the district level, including coordination, training and evaluation not to mention a consistent staff and additional prevention services.
“It wouldn’t have to be exactly like this one but patterned after Ceres,” Greene said.
The Valley Community Counseling model came at an estimated price tag of slightly over $1 million.
Each of the elementary schools would get 21 hours of service with some of the cost possibly being augmented from site funds. Services here would include counseling for crisis intervention, working one on one or small groups on discipline, truancy, and conflict resolution issues.
The pros consist of all training, supervision and evaluation of VCC counselors being conducted by licensed VCC staff. The district would enter into a pact with VCC, which would also provide free trauma counseling and staff training.
Since the VCC counselors hold the necessary degrees and are in training to become licensed counselors, Ruger noted that there’s usually some staff turnover which, in turn, could provide inconsistency of service at some of the school sites, especially those sharing counselors with other sites.
The VCC Plus was listed as an alternative model.
It’s here that each school would get a minimum of 35 hours of one full-time employee who would have to be VCC contracted while paid for by the district.
VCC Plus would offer the same services to students are currently receiving along with training for teachers coupled with school site support from behavior programs such as Second Step.
“Larger sites or those with more need due to student population may be provided with more hours,” Greene said.
She listed the pros as schools not having to allocate site funds for additional hours to meet the needs of the student population.
“This would allow for sites and or regions to use their currently allocated site funds to meet their unique needs,” Greene added. “Full time staff would hopefully address their staff turnover issues by providing for more consistency of service.”
The existing site counseling programs would be augmented by the infusion of additional counseling hours rather than interrupting services due to creating a whole new program.
Medical reimbursements could help in funding this program.
At $1.53 million, VCC Plus would also call for the district to increase service hours.
“Depending upon funding streams, additional safeguards may need to be put into place (under VCC Plus) to measure the outcomes,’ Greene said.
Trustees could look to revisit the three elementary counseling models in January.