Spring 2022 Newsletter

• Brand-New: Strategic Planning Services
• SESC Crisis Response Team
• Coventry Welcomes New Superintendent
• Math Modeling and Reasoning Symposium
• Exciting Updates in SESC Audiology
• Board Member Highlight
• Save the Date: Leadership Symposium

We recognize the challenges that students may suddenly face - the death of a family member/friend, depression/suicidal thoughts. In 2018, we started the SESC Crisis Response Team as a result of districts presenting a need to adequately help students cope with the uncertain circumstances and the stress that they face. 

The team has grown to consist of 57 members across 14 districts in Ohio. When a district experiences a crisis, Summit ESC will send a call out to these trained members to provide support to our schools and students.

Our Crisis Response Team has seen many great successes since its inception. COVID-19 made us realize that the team was being stretched thin and that we needed to update our training to better handle these challenges.

The team had begun training using the PREPaRE model, a nationally certified crisis response model for counselors and faculty developed by educators who have firsthand experience in crisis situations. This model addresses the psychological trauma risks that may be experienced while maintaining the physical health and safety of impacted individuals. Through this training, team members were able to build a better network of resources to use in the event of a school crisis.

We hope to begin Level 2 training with the SESC Crisis Response Team which will help the team specialize in post-prevention and aftermath.

For more information about the Crisis Response Team contact Kristin Fazio at [email protected] or call at 330.945.5600 x513919

We are happy to introduce you to Coventry Local Schools’ new superintendent: George Fisk!

Superintendent Fisk has worked his way through multiple careers as an educator from substitute teacher, to principal, to where he has found his calling as a superintendent. He previously held the position of superintendent at Norwalk City Schools of Huron County and East Palestine City Schools of Columbiana County, giving him 10 years of experience under his belt. He enjoys the challenge and excitement of being a superintendent as he finds it rewarding to be able to watch children of all ages learn.

Fisk has eased his way into his new position by observing and understanding how he can make the district more efficient amongst the financial issues that it is facing. While prioritizing solving these financial issues, he also wants to increase enrollment to his district as students have strayed away from traditional, in-person education and are in favor of online learning. Fisk is a strong believer in public education and has had admired working alongside people who are as passionate as he is in the “art of education”.

Fisk wants to help navigate the district through COVID-19 to ensure that his staff and students continue to be healthy and safe. He admires the teamwork that he has experienced with Summit ESC: 

“No matter what we need help with, they will have or will find someone with the expertise to meet our needs.”

We are excited for Superintendent Fisk’s contributions to the Coventry Local Schools team!

Steve Miller, Summit ESC’s Mathematics Content Consultant, has been working with the Ohio Department of Education in the development of a new pathway in Quantitative Reasoning for Ohio’s Mathematical Modeling and Reasoning (MMR) model course. 

Steve has served you as the main facilitator in both the development of the lessons for the course and all the training for the pilot teachers for the past 3 ½ years:

“During the time of our work on MMR, a national movement moved Ohio to develop multiple pathways to college and career.”

                - Steve Miller

Quantitative Reasoning is the combination of basic mathematics skills and critical thinking in real-world contexts to make decisions relevant to daily life. The Quantitative Reasoning alternative routes to post-secondary education and will not follow the traditional Algebra 2 – Precalculus – Calculus pathway.

The Ohio Department of Education ran a kick-off symposium of Mathematical Pathways in November 2021 that led to numerous applications for this new program. This year there are approximately 85 schools in Ohio participating in Phase 2 of the MMR Pilot. Steve is expecting the number of schools that participated during the 2022-2023 school year to be double the current number.

To learn more about how your district can take advantage of this new program, please reach out to Steve Miller at [email protected] or at 330.945.5600 x511246.

We are pleased to announce some great achievements by our Audiology Team as well as the expansion of the Audiology Team.

1. In November 2021, Dr. Carrie Spangler (lead educational audiologist) received the Fellow of the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (ASHA). The Fellowship award is one of the highest honors that the ASHA bestows for her significant contributions in the areas of clinical service, teaching, and service to the discipline of communication sciences and disorders. In July of 2021, Dr. Spangler had also received the Frederick S Berg Award from the Educational Audiology Association for her notable contributions at the national level in the field of Educational and/or Pediatric Audiology. 

Congratulations Dr. Spangler and thank you for your contributions to Summit ESC and the discipline of Audiology!

2. Summit ESC will be able to provide you with even more services in Audiology as Dr. Crystal Henry has joined our Audiology team, or the “AuD Squad”, as our fourth audiologist. Before joining our Summit ESC, she worked as an Educational Audiologist for the Educational Service Center of Lorain County for two years serving 19 school districts, and also briefly worked in a private practice in Youngstown.

“I have always been so passionate about helping students with hearing loss, as well as early intervention and aural rehabilitation. It is so rewarding to be a part of the educational team and to further help students with hearing loss succeed in the classroom and beyond.”

While training in the Northeast Ohio Au.D. Consortium (NOAC), Dr. Henry completed multiple rotations within audiology such as an ENT setting, Mercy Health – St. Joes and St. Elizabeth’s, and Stark County Educational Service Center. She completed her externship with Cleveland Hearing & Speech Center where she currently resides providing audiology services and education across the surrounding Cleveland areas.

Welcome to the AuD Squad Dr. Henry! We are grateful to have you join our team!

Today we would like to introduce you to the President of the Summit ESC Board of Governors, Mike Chadsey.

Mike has held the position of the Chairman of the Board of Governors since 2018 and will be beginning his second four-year term this year while also serving on the Finance and Policy committees. His family shares a passion for education: his father served as a member of Stow’s Board, his mom a high school coach, his mother-in-law was a superintendent in Stark County, his sister is a teacher in Hudson, and his wife worked at the U.S. Department of Education. 

“Education and the schools mean a lot to my family and this is my way of giving back. I am in communications professionally, so my goal is to help tell our amazing story to our districts and beyond through the media and social channels.”

Mike says that as the parent of a six-year-old and a three-year-old, he knows that educators are being asked to do more with less every day and that the work being done at the Summit ESC can make resources go further by sharing services and creating a platform for idea-sharing. 

He recalls that when the pandemic first hit, the entire team at the Summit ESC stood up and together made it clear that we are here to serve: “[Our] ability to adapt and to show others how to adapt was simply stunning, yet not surprising. From serving as a central hub for mask distribution to guiding districts through the virtual learning word, our team figured it out and lead from the front.”

Thank you for being a proud member of Summit ESC and for your passion and dedication to education!