The Story Of Randolph Academy Union Free School District
Randolph Academy serves students whose emotional and behavioral needs require a small-school setting and extra support. Many of the 200 K-12 students have IEPs that mandate related services like counseling, however, the district’s 11 counselors sometimes had to cancel regularly scheduled sessions to provide crisis counseling at a moment’s notice. Randolph Academy Superintendent Lori DeCarlo chose to implement the online delivery of live, online behavioral and mental health services by PresenceLearning’s network of teletherapy providers to ensure students had access to consistent counseling services and to give the onsite counselors the flexibility to conduct crisis counseling when needed.
Since partnering with PresenceLearning two years ago, approximately 20 students have benefited from the online approach. Last year, two students met their IEP goals and returned to their home school district, which is Randolph Academy’s ultimate goal. DeCarlo and the onsite counselors have also seen an improvement in students’ decision making and behavior. Both students and onsite counselors have embraced the online format. Because of their positive response, Randolph Academy has also started using PresenceLearning’s online speech-language therapy solution.
