Behavior issues decline substantially at a Butler Area elementary school, according to Monday report
One Butler Area School District elementary school has seen a dramatic decrease in student behavior issues in recent years, according to a presentation by the McQuistion Elementary School principal at a Monday, Feb. 24, meeting.
Throughout this school year, three measures indicating student behavior issues have dropped, principal Theresa Cherry said at the school board meeting.
“The staff is working really hard with the students, enforcing expectations and providing positive ways to limit behavioral issues,” said Cherry, who has been in that role for about a year and a half. “It’s not about telling them what not to do, but what to do, replacing behaviors and rewarding positive behavior.”
Specific measures include suspensions, of which the school has only had about 25 to date for the 2024-25 school year. The 2022-23 year saw about 80 suspensions for the year.
Other measures, minor and major referrals, have also declined steeply.
There have been only 330 minor referrals documented at the elementary school within the current school year, Cherry said. This is in contrast to the 528 documented during the 2023-24 year, and a significant turnaround from the 1,011 documented referrals during the 2022-23 year.
Minor referrals are defined as behavior issues that are able to be addressed and corrected within the classroom.
When examining major referrals, Cherry reports only 120 major referrals have been documented to date for the current year. Once again, this is in contrast to 206 referrals documented for the 2023-24 year, and 1,179 documented referrals for the 2022-23 year.
Major referrals are defined as behavior issues that are addressed on the administrative level.
According to Cherry, when examining referrals documents, administration has found that many of these documented behaviors come from repeat offenders. Cherry said she and the teachers are closely working with those students and their parents to help reinforce positive behaviors.
To engage with students and bolster attendance, Cherry said McQuistion Elementary has students participate in “theme weeks” about once a month.
During the week of Jan. 28-31, students were invited to join in on days like, “soaring makes me warm and fuzzy,” when students were encouraged to wear fuzzy or fleece clothing while exemplifying behaviors that would make them warm and fuzzy.
According to Cherry, each day during theme week is designed to work on reinforcing positive behaviors to allow students to have safe learning environments.
To engage with parents, Cherry publishes a weekly newsletter to keep parents informed on what their children are learning in the classroom.
“We talk about what the students are learning, what we’re reinforcing, and a three to four sentence blurb about what the kids are doing in each subject,” Cherry said.
Cherry first began publishing her weekly newsletter last year and said she has seen an increase in engagement from parents.
“I’ve worked really hard on different ways in which to engage with families,” Cherry said.
According to Cherry, the newsletter is also a great way to give shout-outs to students like those who have perfect attendance.
Brian White, school superintendent, praised Cherry for the work she’s done since in the short amount of time she’s been at McQuistion.
“Mrs. Cherry has done an exceptional job during her time here, working collaboratively with her faculty and staff,” White said.
White is very happy with the student successes the school is seeing, including the downward trending behavioral issues. Issues White said may have been a factor of post-COVID remote learning as students reentered the classroom.
