EXCHANGE: Students with severe emotional challenges get help

ROCK FALLS, Ill. (AP) - Dakota Rick is going home, and he’s bringing some pretty sweet shop skills with him.

Jan. 19 was the 10-year-old’s last day at Thome School, which provides special education for K-12 students with severe emotional challenges. Jan. 20 he was to be back at Erie Elementary full-time.

“It’s awesome when you can finally do that,” said Stephanie Guenther, who has taught at Thome 13 years, and who had Dakota during third grade last year.

“When you get them, they don’t have much confidence in themselves, their behavior is out of control, and they don’t know how to control themselves,” Guenther said. “To see the growth and confidence they feel when their academics improve, because their behavior’s improving, it’s a positive cycle for them, rather than the negative cycle they’ve had at their other school.”

Jan. 19 offered its own unique challenge: soldering practice for a stained-glass art project in Rob Berry’s shop class.

“(Shop) builds their confidence for doing this, but more importantly, it builds their confidence in a general sense,” said Berry, who’s in his 19th year at the school. “I want my kids to be successful at school, but more importantly, I want them to be successful after school - when they go home at 3 p.m., and when they’re 21.”

Even though they first practiced soldering with the irons off a week ago, Dakota and his classmates coolly handled the 700-degree tools - while answering questions about their projects, too.

Third-grader Donna Jo Hart, 8, who’s working toward transitioning back to Prophetstown Elementary, admits the heat was a bit intimidating initially.

But now? “It’s kind of awesome,” she said.

“I burned my fingers,” Dakota said with a laugh. “They feel smooth now, like it burned off all the dead skin.”

On the other end of the room, kids sanded glass mosaic tiles and wrapped their edges in copper tape. Once their soldering skills are ready, they’ll put flux on the tape and solder the 2-by-2-inch pieces into stained glass art. Then they’ll do the 3-by-4-inch tiles.

“I’ve got tons of tiles,” Berry said.

He’s also got money left over from the $500 grant he landed through the Bi-County Foundation, and so the class might build wooden frames for the art, which the kids will take home.

Two years ago, Berry used a grant to set up the shop class, where he has taught students how to build boxes and wire them for electricity.

“Mr. Berry is trying to teach us important skills we might need to have,” said Dakota, who’s eager to get back to his home school.

“I’ll miss my friends here,” Dakota said. “I’ll actually get to see most of my friends who are in other classes, because of recess. Yeah, friends are what I’m looking forward to.”

Students most often land at Thome because of academic failures that lead to acting out. Deciding when they’re ready to transition back can be tricky. They get all the same courses, on a less-intense level than at their home school, but the goal is fixing bad behavior.

There’s a system, naturally, that requires students to ascend levels, after which a meeting is held with staff from the home school.

What if Thome gives them the best shot at success, though?

“If you don’t want to go back, you don’t have to,” Berry said. “I’ll never force a kid to go back. That’s just setting them up for failure. If they don’t want to go back, they’ll act out on purpose.”

Laurie Heston, director of the Bi-County Foundation and the Bi-County Special Education Cooperative, heralds Berry as “one of our very best in transitioning kids back to their home school.”

“You go through spurts,” Berry said. “In one year, you transition three or four kids back. Then you might go 3 years without transitioning anyone back.”

Getting them back is emotionally complicated, too.

“Students do well here for two reasons: One, because they’re ready to go back, like Dakota,” Berry said. “The others do well because this is the right program for them. We have kids I think would be ready to go back, but they don’t want to.

“On a personal level, it makes me feel good that the kid feels comfortable in my class, makes me feel good as a person. As a teacher, it makes me feel sad in a way, because I want them to be able to go back.”

Dakota is the second student to transition back to his home school this year after having had Guenther as a teacher. She’s made peace with saying goodbye.

“The most amazing thing is, when you know you don’t want them to go, that’s when it’s time for them to go.”

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Source: The (Sterling) Daily Gazette, https://bit.ly/2k9XGoN

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Information from: The Daily Gazette, https://www.saukvalley.com