At Bishop Leibold School, our goal has always been to meet students where they are and help them reach academic success that is specific to their individual needs. In 2019, we adopted an approach that helps us more accurately identify the needs and strengths of our students in order to better serve them. Utilizing Multi-Tiered Student Support (MTSS), our team of intervention specialists, teachers, counselors, aides, and parents are able to come together and work as a unified team to set each student up for success. Through differentiated classroom instruction and small group instructional support, individual strengths are fostered and praised while additional needs are addressed.
“MTSS is vital for us to be consistent as an entire staff,” says Dr. Theodore Wallace, principal of Bishop Leibold “in doing so, we are able to work with our students that need the most help, and our highest achievers so that they are being appropriately challenged in the classroom.”
MTSS is just one component of the strides that Bishop Leibold continues to take to serve each individual student. Bishop Leibold is also an official provider of the Jon Peterson Special Needs Scholarship (JPSN), a K-12 program that provides scholarships to students who have an Individualized Education Program (IEP) from their local district but prefer to attend a participating private school.
Bishop Leibold also holds many unique collaborations with specialized community partners. One such partnership is with The Reading Lab, a program that provides dyslexia testing, training & tutoring services to “bright but struggling” readers during the school day. “Our partnership with Bishop Leibold is quite unique since we have the opportunity to serve students during the school day. Families really appreciate this in addition to the impact it is having on helping unlock the full potential of their children.” says Donna Donahue, director of The Reading Lab.
Bishop Leibold also has established a partnership with the University of Dayton’s Empowering Children with Hope and Opportunity (ECHO). Bishop Leibold has held many student, staff, and parent information sessions with ECHO for years. We are proud to say that as of this school year, an ECHO counselor now spends time on-site at Bishop Leibold, helping the families and staff to more effectively address the mental health needs of our students.
It is enhancements to our programming through initiatives like those listed above, constant communication and collaboration among our staff, and commitment from our school families that make Bishop Leibold School a wonderful place for every student.
