Sandy Stack, a recovery supports project manager at the Southern Oregon Education Service District, has been working to create a recovery high school in Jackson County. JPR鈥檚 Jane Vaughan recently spoke with Stack about her work, the need for more recovery high schools and what might happen to the project now.
We're here today to talk about a potential funding hurdle to open a new recovery high school in Jackson County. First off, can you tell me what a recovery high school is?
Sandy Stack: Absolutely, so an Oregon recovery school is a public school in Oregon that is a school of choice for teenagers that are in recovery from substance use disorders. It's a small school, community designed to be small intentionally, to have a community of peers with the same kind of similar lived experiences to support each other in their goals of sobriety and graduation. We're working on providing a high-quality education, but also integrating comprehensive substance use services and mental health services for students.
So all of that is sort of part of the school package for these kids who need these services. And how do they end up at a recovery high school? Are they referred? Is it by choice?
It's a school of choice. So students are choosing this as something that's going to support their goals of sobriety and graduation. It's not a school that can be referred as far as districts or courts actually requiring a student to attend. It truly is something that students and families are choosing.
It's not a punishment for something.
Correct.
Tell me about your efforts. I know you've been working to try to create a recovery high school in Jackson County. What has that process been like?
The conversation actually started a little over a year ago with our director of student services and Jackson Care Connect at a behavioral health summit where they were really doing a needs assessment of the whole region. What's happening with our youth and substance use and mental health? How can we help and come alongside and really think creatively with some new solutions that really leverage resources across the community to address the community-wide problem?
So around that same time, the state of Oregon had passed , which allowed the Oregon Department of Education to open up to nine recovery high schools across the state over a handful of upcoming bienniums. So, of course, our region thought that's an absolutely amazing opportunity for our students. How can we plan and prepare for something like this? So lots of community conversations began happening, some conversations with our component school districts (and) community-based organizations.
We knew that the first year that they were offering potential applications for Oregon recovery schools was actually for this school year, and it wasn't something that the timeline really was going to allow us to step into. It was a really quick timeline, but we definitely made plans for the next opportunity, the next request for applications, which is actually happening right now. So the Oregon Department of Education just opened up the request for application on March 31. It closes at the end of April, and they plan to notify people in May if they get the contract to be able to open up a recovery school for this next school year, the 2025-2026 school year, which is an amazing opportunity.
So we absolutely dove in and started planning for those efforts. Our CCOs actually funded through grant funds the hiring of my position, which is a project manager, to plan and prepare the application, do all of the development planning of this new recovery high school. So I was brought on board right around Thanksgiving of this school year, and by January, we were hosting a really great community engagement event where we co-facilitated that and presented with the Oregon Department of Education.
We had members of community-based organizations, treatment partners, Jackson County Public Health and Human Services, component school districts, just everyone in Southern Oregon who's already involved in the work of really coming alongside students and youth and working on the problem of substance use that we have in our area. It was amazing. So that was in January. That was the community engagement event.
Shortly after that, we hosted a steering committee with a bunch of those same diverse stakeholders really coming together. We outlined what the school's mission, vision, core values would be that really set the foundation for planning for what this school is going to look like. What is it going to feel like? What do we want students to walk away with or develop while they're here?
We've been spending time really developing operational plans, a three-year budget, forming partnerships with different community organizations to really leverage all of the existing resources we have within our community to make sure that we are really going to successfully meet the needs of our students. They're complex needs, and it's going to be more than just educational staff or traditional school models. We need to bring in those treatment partners. We need to bring in organizations that provide family coaching and peer mentorship.
So we've been developing all of those partnerships and plans, and right now, we're just finalizing the pieces of our application to be ready to submit to the Oregon Department of Education by the end of the month.
It's coming up quick!
It is.
But I understand there's been a little bit of maybe a hiccup, that there might not be as much funding as you maybe thought, that maybe this recovery high school might not happen. Can you tell me about that?
The funding has definitely shifted a bit over the last couple of months. We actually anticipated that the Oregon Department of Education was going to be opening up the request for applications in February for potentially up to three additional recovery high schools. That actually was delayed a couple of months, I believe, because of the state funding and just the barriers that were starting to be in place with the governor's recommended budget.
It sounded like the full amount that the Oregon Department of Education was requesting for those three additional recovery high schools was not included at that full amount, not fully funded in the recommended budget. So there's been a lot of happening at the state level. We've been involved in that as well, submitting written testimony, public testimony, really speaking to the importance of making sure that these recovery high schools are offered, and across the state, where they're distributed across the state.
Right now, the three recovery schools that are already up and running are up in the Portland and Salem areas. Our area in Southern Oregon, that is not accessible for students, and we have such a regional gap in services for our students who have substance use disorders and co-occurring mental health challenges. We really need to have one down here in our area, so we've done our best to support making sure that our leaders in the state understand the need to make sure when they're considering the final budget that it does include the full requested amount.
So the request for application has opened, and it seems like the intent of the Oregon Department of Education is to approve one additional recovery school in the state of Oregon, with the potential of approving two more later, maybe September-ish, once the state budget is actually finalized. So it sounds like definitely one and up to an additional two if they do actually indeed increase that amount allocated for recovery schools.
"Our area in Southern Oregon, that is not accessible for students, and we have such a regional gap in services."Sandy Stack
Okay, so some funding challenges statewide. You had thought there would be money for three more schools statewide. Now sounds like only one immediately, and then potentially two in the future. So you're submitting your application with the hope that you will be the one that is picked, and if it's not picked now, maybe to be picked in the fall.
Absolutely, and we're really confident that our application is going to be really strong and really paint the picture of the unique needs and challenges in our area and how a recovery school really does provide a solution to so many of those challenges. It's a life-saving support, and our application really does paint the picture of the incredible need that this would be filling. It also includes and highlights the amazing community partnerships that have been formed down here to really make sure that this is going to be a successful opportunity once it gets up and running. The partnerships have been amazing to really make sure that we're going to be able to meet the needs of our students in a sustainable way.
You're talking about the needs in our community specifically. Tell me more about that. Why is there such a need for this type of high school in Jackson County, in Southern Oregon?
Southern Oregon actually is the region with the highest amount of providers and organizations saying that they don't have the capacity to meet the needs of their clients. We're tied with two other counties for the highest risk of hospitalization due to alcohol and drug use.
And would this high school serve only students who live in Jackson County? Or could you come from elsewhere?
Students can come from anywhere in Oregon. They just need to be an Oregon resident and have it make sense as far as their travel time because it's not a residential program. It is a day-to-day school. We would provide transportation for students to attend and look at all of the different transportation options to serve as many students as possible. We really want to make sure that this school is as accessible to students in Southern Oregon as possible and really remove that transportation barrier.
We're also looking at potentially opening satellite locations as part of our scale-up plan. So Oregon recovery schools can open satellite locations. They're even smaller than the primary location. The primary location would be looking at serving about 30 students, where satellite locations can serve around 10 students. So we'd be looking at a primary location somewhere between Ashland and Grants Pass, and then hopefully in the next three to five years, opening up a satellite location in Klamath Falls and also one in Josephine County.
How does the staffing work at a school like that? When you've only got 30 kids, do you need a full roster of teachers? Or what does that look like?
Yeah, so it actually would have a pretty robust staffing structure because of the complex needs of the students. So we would have an administrator as well as a teacher and an educational assistant, but we'd also have on-site all day accessible professionals, like mental health professionals and a certified alcohol and drug counselor. We'd also have a peer mentor available during the day, too, for students.
Would this school be funded entirely by state money? Or are there other funding sources for this?
We are looking at alternative funding sources to just make sure that we can have sustainable funding long-term. We're looking at partnerships as well. We have community-based organizations that have sponsored and pledged to provide some of their resources to our students. So for example, that certified alcohol and drug counselor and qualified mental health professional, those are going to be sponsored by community-based partners. So that's not going to need to come out of that state funding amount, which is amazing.
We also have another community-based partner who's going to be providing the parent training, and another who's going to be providing the drug testing that we need to do to measure sobriety for our students. So there's a lot of partnerships that are going to make the funding a bit more of a braided model, really community-wide coming together and allocating some resources. We're also looking at some competitive grants that are available.
There's a lot of grant opportunities out there to address the problems around unmet needs related to substance use and mental health for youth. So we'll definitely be looking at those. But we don't want a substantial amount of the operation of the school to rely on competitive grants either.
"We're super hopeful that if they select only one, that it will be Southern Oregon."Sandy Stack
If you don't get approved by the state, if your application isn't picked either in the spring or in the fall, what will you do? Will the high school still open with other funding sources, or is that kind of uncertain at this point?
We wouldn't be able to open without the state funding. The state funding would be a majority of the funding going towards the operation of the school, but what we are looking at is how to improve the school-based services in each of our component high schools, especially to really enhance what's available for students in their schools. So if we can't open a separate school of choice recovery high school, we at least will be enhancing what's available to students where they are at their component school districts.
You'll still try to get those services to students, maybe in a different way, through the Southern Oregon Education Service District, if you don't get the state money and aren't able to open the recovery high school.
Absolutely.
So you're sort of waiting at this point to see, you have to submit your application, and then we'll see what the state decides after that.
Yeah, and again, we're super hopeful that if they select only one, that it will be Southern Oregon.
Is there anything that you would recommend if someone is listening to this and they really want to be involved or see this recovery high school happen, what would you recommend?
I think the only thing would just be continuing to advocate for additional services and funding across the state. It is a priority in the state. I know that there were a lot of different House bills and Senate bills introduced in this legislative session to really enhance what's available across the state.
Testimony matters, public testimony and support, and just getting in front of those leaders as they're making those decisions. So, anyone in the community who is really interested in making this happen, whether it's the recovery school or additional school-based services, really just reaching out and connecting with those state leaders and advocating is going to be a huge, huge benefit.
