Videos

The Alliance Against Seclusion and Restraint produces bi-weekly live events including presentation and interviews with experts from across the United States.

• Presentations
• Interviews

Presentations

Mona Delahooke Ph.D: Understanding Beyond Behavior in Challenging Times

Our special guest Mona Delahooke, Ph.D. will be talking about the hope that comes from understanding how we can manage stress from a Polyvagal (body-brain) perspective.

Dr: Ross Greene: Moving from Crisis Management to True Crisis Prevention: New Lenses, New Timing, and New Practices

There are many factors that have contributed to an over-reliance on restraint and seclusion procedures in schools. There’s no question that many students are unavailable for learning, are not medically or behaviorally stable, and respond to frustration in ways that are extremely aggressive and violent. But there are other factors that have little to do with characteristics of the kids. For example, much of the training that school staff receive to help them prevent crises are actually primarily focused on managing crises. Staff have also been led to believe that such training helps keep them and their students safer, when there are actually no data supporting this claim. And many staff are still viewing challenging behavior through old, inaccurate lenses and still relying on traditional behavior management procedures, which can actually precipitate challenging episodes. Moving in a different direction requires new lenses, new timing, and new practices.

Christopher S. Feltner: Patience in a Time of Panic

In this session, Christopher Feltner from Ukeru Systems will give families and caregivers a basic understanding of what trauma is, how it affects the brain, and how it can affect behavior. Given this understanding, we’ll look at some ways to provide support and a trauma-informed approach in the home during this pandemic.

Allison Hoffmaster: Balancing Act: A Mother’s Story

In this session Allison will share how she has made creative adjustments in her home during this pandemic. Allison will share how to use a comfort vs. control approach within your home. She will discuss her experience juggling work and teaching a child with special needs at home.

Robin Roscigno: Concrete Strategies to Support Executive Functioning

Is your child struggling with organization, task-completion, motivation and/or attention? Covid-19 has disrupted many routines and structures that neurodivergent children rely on, causing many parents and kids to be frustrated and overwhelmed with this new normal. This informational webinar will provide parents and educators with valuable information about executive functioning—what it is, why it’s hard for many children, and what they can do to support kids during these times and after. Participants will walk away with several useful, actionable strategies they can put in place right away.

Lori Desautels: How Our Brains Learn, Feel, Behave, and Socialize When There is Adversity and Trauma

In this session we will explore brain development through an educator’s lens. We will learn how adversity and trauma affect the way we learn, behave, and perceive the world, addressing specific brain aligned strategies that regulate our nervous systems and help us to connect with one another. We will begin to understand that traditional discipline works the best for kids that need it the least and works the least for kids who need it the most. When we are dysregulated, our brains do not respond to words, lectures, consequences, or rewards. Relational discipline is not something we do to children, it is something we want to create within them.

Gregory Czyszczon Ph.D: Attachment Security & the Neurobiology of Crisis, Trauma & Resilience

Unparalleled. Unprecedented. Extraordinary. Whatever descriptor you use for this time of societal crisis, it is clear that we are facing any number of defining moments as we struggle with COVID-19, systemic racism and institutionalized injustice, economic freefall, and climate change. How have our brains and nervous systems evolved to respond to crisis and trauma? What is attachment and how does it support and enhance our capacity for resilience? How can the tiny ripples of attachment security in our daily lives influence these massive forces moving in our country and across the globe? Join Dr. Gregory Czyszczon as we explore these topics through the lens of interpersonal neurobiology.

Chelsea Bonini: Running for local office demystified

Have you decided to run for local office – or are considering it? This session outlines the basics of campaign readiness, preparation, execution and compliance. We hope that this information will make you feel that running for office is possible and might even be fun!

Donna Shea: Behavior The Language of Children

Children communicate through their behavior. Behavioral problems may occur when we misunderstand what a child is trying to tell us. Adults may find themselves continuously addressing the same behaviors and wondering why their child keeps repeating these behaviors. This workshop will help you to get under the behavior and discover what it is a child is trying to tell you. The workshop will provide simple, yet effective tools for recognizing and managing the underlying causes of children’s behavior. We’ll explore the role that anxiety, avoidance, attention-seeking, and communication challenges play, and share strategies to assist in better understanding what children are trying so hard to communicate with us.

Interviews

Beth Tolley: Education or incarceration: Ending America’s school-to-prison pipeline

Join us for an interview with Beth Tolley. Why are more disabled and minority children ending up on a path from school to prison and what can be done to stop it?

Alexander Campbell: An advocate’s journey: A mission to end seclusion & restraint

Join us for a special interview with self advocate Alex Campbell. Alex is an advocate for students with disabilities and the Executive Director of Campbell Advocacy. Alex is the KASSA Campaign Director for the Alliance Against Seclusion and Restraint. Alex is also proud to be a part of the education team at the Human Projects. He attends high school in a public school setting in rural Virginia. Alex is enrolled in Powhatan High School’s Advanced College Academy program. This means that he will graduate high school and earn his Associate’s Degree through Reynolds Community College concurrently. Alex was diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder when he was 3 years old.

Sam Maloney: Making Positive Change Through Negative Experiences

Join us for a special interview with self advocate Sam Maloney. Sam Maloney is a 20 year photographer from Rochester, NY. Sam started his photography journey at 10 years old. Sam is a restraint and seclusion survivor from the age of 5 to 14 years old. Sam is continuing his photography education through his person centered plan through New York State. Sam is also working to support autism acceptance. Autism on US Routes 11 and 20 is a a journey to inspire others to see the best in themselves. Sam will be traveling the country to spread his campaign to change Autism Awareness to Autism Acceptance.

Imani Hill & Cheryl Poe: Blowing the whistle on institutional racism

When Imani Hill arrived at her new job, she learned that rather than a co-teaching position, she would be responsible for teaching six black boys with Individualized Educational Plans (IEP). The boys were currently spending their days in a conference room with the Assistant Principal. When Ms. Hill arrived, they were moved to a classroom where she was to be their teacher. The students’ IEPs were not provided to her initially, nor was she given any guidance about the students’ levels of functioning or what they needed to be working on. When Ms. Hill did receive copies of the IEPs, she saw that they were out of date. She also saw that the move from regular class placement to the segregated special education class was not documented, nor was there documentation of communication about this with the students’ parents. In mid-January, Ms. Hill was asked to update the IEPs, but to backdate them to December. She refused.

Emma Van Der Klift: Talk to me

Student disruption at school can take up an enormous amount of time, energy, and even financial resources. Confrontations can result not only in personal stress for both students and teachers, but in conflicts that involve families and the larger community. However, it’s not always easy to know what to do or how to respond.In this original and highly engaging book, Emma Van der Klift suggests that “cross-pollination” – applying the lenses of one field to the issues faced by another – can generate unexpected insights and open new ways to think and act. Based on a year’s worth of fascinating interviews with hostage negotiators from all over North America, this book shows how crisis negotiators de-escalate distraught individuals through communication. Instead of relying on either punishment, reward or directives – something commonly done in education – hostage negotiators rely on listening and support and are successful in resolving more than 90 percent of the issues they are called upon to negotiate without loss of life, injury, or the use of coercion.

Leslie Said Margolis: Interview with Leslie Seid Margolis a managing attorney with Disability Rights Maryland

Leslie Seid Margolis is a managing attorney at Disability Rights Maryland, Maryland’s protection and advocacy agency, where she has worked since 1985. In her practice at DRM, she handles individual special education cases and engages in special education policy work at the local, state and national levels, and she has extensive experience with systemic urban school reform litigation, having co-counseled the 28 year Baltimore City Vaughn G. case for many years. Ms. Margolis is a frequent presenter at local, state and national trainings and conferences, and has published technical assistance documents, manuals, and articles. She has been a member of several national boards, including TASH, the Epilepsy Foundation and COPAA, and currently sits on several Maryland-based boards. In 2014, Ms. Margolis was the co-recipient of COPAA’s Diane Lipton Award for Outstanding Advocacy. She received the Outstanding Advocate of the Year award from The Arc Maryland in 2017.

Representative Johnathan Carroll: Interview with Illinois State Representative Jonathan Carroll about the use of restraint/seclusion

Representative Carroll shares his work to make classrooms a safe for all students. Back in November an investigation by ProPublica and Chicago Tribune exposed what seclusion and restraint is like for students in Illinois Public Schools. Over a period of a school year and half prone restraint was used on 1,300 students in Illinois public schools. As you likely know, prone restraint is when a person is held face down on the floor or ground just as was done with Max Benson, George Floyd, Cornelius Fredrick, and a number of other children and adults who have also lost their lives from this practice. It’s recorded that 30 IL school students complained “I can’t breathe” yet the restraint went on. One student said “your gonna get me dead.” Over two dozen times injuries were severe enough that an ambulance had to be called. The US Dept of education has given guidance that “prone restraints… should neve be used because they can cause serious injury or death.” Even one instance of physical restraint can cause traumatization. The majority of the students subjected to seclusion and restraint have behavioral or intellectual disabilities. The ISBE acted fast after the investigation was published in an article titled Quiet Rooms, and emergency rules were put into place banning the use of isolated seclusion and prone-restraint.