Who are we?

The department of Student Services’ primary goal is to ensure that our schools are supported to “identify and deliver effective programming for students with special education needs” (Standards for Special Education, Alberta Education). Our team members are: Erika Kronstal – Occupational Therapist, Natasha Nickel – Speech Language Pathologist, Don Gerla – Early Childhood Coordinator, Dan Hamilton – Family School Liaison Coordinator, Sherry Opas – Behaviour/ Student Services Coordinator, Kathryn Saito – Provisional Psychologist, Gloria Lundberg – Administrative assistant, and Marcia Muldoon – Director.

Our team supports all specialized programming in the schools which includes such areas as: early identification of special needs through Kindergarten and pre-Kindergarten screenings, specialized assessments by other related professionals, coordination of additional services, development of IPPs, helping schools in the various levels of academic and behavioural response to intervention provided, etc. We strive to maintain our school division’s motto of “Leave not one heart behind” by ensuring that our students have the resources and support required to best achieve their potential.

Each of our schools has a Learning Support Teacher who usually also acts as the lead for the Learning Team and facilitates all of the specialized programming listed above. Each school also has a Family School Liaison Worker who works with individuals, small groups, families, or within classrooms in the area of social/ emotional needs. Many of our schools also have a Communication Room for those students who require highly specialized support at certain times. While our schools have many similarities in the programming they offer, they also have unique approaches to meeting the needs of their students.

We have an innovative program at John Paul II Collegiate, Holy Trinity Academy, and St. Luke’s Outreach Centre in Okotoks called the “Connections Program”. In these schools, we have School Connections Workers and a Community Connections Worker to work with the school, parents and student while the student is on an in-school suspension. The focus of the work is three-fold: 1) maintaining academics 2) providing social/ emotional support 3) restorative justice.

We also work with other departments and initiatives to help provide all students within the authentic Catholic environments of our schools with the knowledge and skills they need to fulfil the plan God has for each of their lives.