To:
From:
RE:
Date:
County Superintendents
Dr. Kathy J. D’Antoni, Chief Officer, Career Technical Education
Jacob Green, Special Assistant to the Chief Officer
Truancy Diversion Grant Recipients
12/10/15
Truancy Diversion Showcase 2015-2016
“ONE VOICE, ONE FOCUS: ALL STUDENTS ACHIEVING”
Pillar III: Improving Organizational Effectiveness:
Priority 6. We will increase efforts to improve student attendance rates and reduce the
overall student truancy, suspension and juvenile incarceration rates.
Beginning in February, the Division of Career Technical Education will be hosting
Truancy Diversion Showcase Webinars from 10:00 to 11:30 am
http://wvde.state.wv.us/institutional/TruancyDiversion.html with presentations from
counties making efforts to direct youth to positive school attendance by utilizing truancy
diversion grant funding. All counties are invited to participate in the webinars as a
means to gain insight on truancy diversion tactics around the state. The webinars will
be a method of providing grant receiving counties the opportunity to share information
about their use of funding for a truancy diversion specialist. Each grant receiving county
is asked to present the following components from their application in a 20 minute
block:
 The results of their juvenile assessment;
 The success of their diversion agreement and which community services or work
service programs are accessed;
 The current outcomes of the initiative, ;
 Types of supervision of youth occurring;
 The level of communication occurring with WVDE transition specialists for
students returning from OIEP placement;
 Examples of services OIEP transition specialists could provide to better serve the
student and the district;
 How the LEA working with the Youth Reporting Center;
 Types of innovative and creative preventative strategies are being implemented;
and,
 Unique programs or processes the LEA is implementing to redirect youth toward
positive school attendance.
Memorandum - Truancy Diversion Grant Recipients
Page Two
December 10, 2015
Dates of Webinars, Proposed District and Tentative Topics to be presented:
February 9: Marion (SBPO), Monongalia (SBPO) and Mercer (SBPO)
 Additional Topic: Senate Bill 393 (Jacob Green, Special Assistant to the Chief
Officer and Cindy Largent-Hill, Juvenile Justice Commission Director)
February 23: Randolph (SBPO), Pocahontas (TSW) and Nicholas (SBPO)
 Additional Topic: Juvenile Justice Prevention (Jacob Green)
March 1: Boone (SBPO), Gilmer (TSW) and Cabell (SBPO)
 Additional Topic: Youth Reporting Centers (Jason Wright, Community Based
Services Director, DJS)
March 15: Brooke (SBPO), Putnam (SBPO) and Clay (TSW)
 Additional Topic: OIEP Sites and the role of the Transition Specialist (Jacob
Green)
March 29: Doddridge (TSW) and Kanawha (TSW)
 Additional Topic: OIEP Career Integrated Experiential Learning (CIEL) (Dr.
Christina Chambers, Executive Director OIEP and Donna Burge-Tetrick, Executive
Director CTE)
April 12: Logan (SBPO), Wirt (SBPO) and Wayne (SBPO)
 Additional Topic: SAMSHA Project Aware Mental Health Initiative in McDowell,
Berkeley and Wood counties based on Community Schools Framework (Paula
Fields, Community Schools Coordinator and Jackie Payne, State Coordinator,
Project Aware)
April 26: Mason (SBPO), Greenbrier (SBPO) and Raleigh (TSW)
 Additional Topic: Out of Home Placement (Jacob Green)
May 10: McDowell (SBPO) and Monroe (SBPO)
 Additional Topic: 2016-17 Truancy Diversion Opportunities (Jacob Green)
Each county designee is asked to submit PowerPoint slides or attachments to Dr.
Christina Chambers cdchambe@k12.wv.us 10 business days prior to presentation.
The county attendance director and truancy diversion specialist are asked to participate
and can invite county personnel involved in the project accordingly.
Other individuals who will participate in the webinar series include:
 Cindy Largent-Hill, Director of the Juvenile Justice Commission,
 Jason Wright, Director of Community Based Services,
 Stephanie Bond, Executive Director DJS,
Memorandum - Truancy Diversion Grant Recipients
Page Three
December 10, 2015
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Karen Yost, CEO Prestera Mental Health,
Linda Watts, Deputy Commissioner for Bureau of Children and Families,
Mike Lacy, Director, Division of Probation Services, WVSCA,
Joey Garcia, Director of Legislative Affairs, Office of the Governor, and
Alyssa Keedy, Policy Analyst, Office of the Governor.
The monthly webinar agenda will be as follows: updates and initiatives from OIEP, DJS
or DHHR pertinent to truancy diversion followed by the counties in the order in which
they are listed. Each webinar will conclude with questions from the field. Participation
is encouraged; please notify Dr. Christina Chambers cdchambe@k12.wv.us of your
intention to participate by January 5, 2016.
KD/CC