The Norwalk-La Mirada Unified School District Board of Education has confirmed the appointment Dina Wilson, former Principal of Norwalk High School to the newly created position of Director of Intervention and Mental Health Support Services.
Wilson has been in the NLMUSD for 12 years as an administrator.
She has a B.S in Biological Sciences with a minor in Psychology from UC Irvine and a Masters in Administration from Pepperdine University. She has worked wit
h special education and “at risk” students throughout her career and is looking forward to developing much needed counseling and support services to enable those students to adapt successfully to the school environment.
This position is being funded entirely from restricted categorical funding that is available to school districts under Assembly Bill (AB) 114.
AB 114, which became law on June 30, 2011, changed the previous legislation of AB 3632 which allowed county mental health agencies to provide educationally related mental health services to students with disabilities in cooperation with school districts. With the passage of AB 114, school districts are now solely responsible for ensuring that students with disabilities receive special education and related services, including some services previously arranged for or provided by county mental health agencies.
What does this mean for Norwalk La Mirada Unified’ s (NLMUSD) staff, students and families? According to district officials, essentially responsibilities for the assessment, placement and monitoring of students with disabilities that were previously administered by the county mental health agencies according to the requirements for mental health services for students with Individual Education Plans (IEPs) under the federal Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) legislation have been transferred to Districts. The state of California has redirected the funding for these mental health services to school districts as well.
NLMUSD is implementing a transition plan to address these special education services in collaboration with the local Special Education Local Area Plan (SELPA), which includes both NLMUSD and ABC Unified School Districts in order to meet the needs of our special education students requiring educationally related mental health services.
“Our new Director plans to coordinate and develop mental health services such as counseling, crisis management, dropout prevention and support for special education students in non-public school settings in a variety of ways. She will lead the District’s efforts to create and implement a positive behavior intervention system (PBIS), which in conjunction with timely academic interventions will enable staff and students to have resources to support students who are struggling with school,” Superintendent Dr. Ruth Perez said.
Wilson will work collaboratively with the Special Education Director and the local SELPA Director to coordinate these programs with community agencies through the hiring of additional psychologists, social workers and counseling staff as well as through comprehensive training programs for both special education and non-special education staff.
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