Nitro Elementary Named West Virginia PBIS Spotlight School

From Kanawha County Schools:

February 2, 2021

Nitro Elementary School was named a 2020 West Virginia PBIS Spotlight School by the West Virginia Behavior/Mental Health Technical Assistance Center (WVBMHTAC).

In collaboration with the WV Autism Training Center at Marshall University and the WV Department of Education's Office of Special Education, the WVBMHTAC oversees, in addition to other initiatives, the state's school-wide Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports (PBIS) project. For the 2020-2021 school year, the WV PBIS Leadership Team began searching for West Virginia Spotlight Schools. These are schools that are implementing PBIS to fidelity and have found ways to use PBIS to pivot their expectations, acknowledgements, relationships with students and families, found ways to provide additional mental health and social/emotional supports, and adjusted their environments, systems, and teams to ensure the best outcomes possible during a challenging situation.

Nitro Elementary School, along with principal Ashley Garrett and her PBIS team, surpassed the organization's standards to be awarded this recognition. The WV PBIS Leadership team noted that the fact that Nitro Elementary is dedicated to the mental health and social emotional learning of their students is evidenced by their ongoing goals. They also stated that the school should be commended for continuing to use the PBIS framework to support their staff and students during this unique time in our education history.

WV PBIS Coordinator, Alicia Ziman, says "The Spotlight Schools project helps us model PBIS to new schools, allows us to be partners in the learning process of implementing PBIS, and highlights the work that we do across the state. We are proud to highlight the persistence and grit that these WV PBIS Spotlight Schools have shown during these unique circumstances."

The WVBMHTAC is so appreciative of Nitro's dedication to the PBIS framework and we look forward to how this recognition as a Spotlight School can help support other schools across the state.

This press release was produced by the Kanawha County Schools. The views expressed here are the author’s own.