High Road Program Philadelphia – Fergusonconnormustakas2024-08-06T16:54:36-04:00
High Road Program at Philadelphia – Ferguson
The High Road Program at Ferguson is a High School that is classified by the School District of Philadelphia as an Intermediate Unit. As an IU we are able to offer Special Education students individualized education within the confines of an existing school district building. We serve students who have struggled to find success in Emotional Support classrooms or in other Approved Private Schools. Our goals are to decrease behavior issues, increase participation rates, and see individualized growth based on our student’s needs. We aim to get our students involved in organizations that will help them learn about job readiness to ensure they are ready for their next step after High School.
Amanda Strenger has worked in the special education field for over 12 years. She has held various positions including special teacher, lead special education teacher, case manager, and lead case manager. Amanda has always served the youth in Philadelphia including her position as a lead special education teacher at an approved private school. Amanda currently serves as the program director for the High Road Program of Philadelphia at Ferguson and Frankford. Amanda holds a bachelor’s degree in Special Education from West Chester University, and is finishing up her Master’s in Special Education from Drexel University.
Waverly Harris, Associate Director
Waverly Harris has been working in special education for the past 6 years. He previously worked with adjudicated youth and crisis intervention. He has held several special education positions such as teacher, climate manager, and has served as Associate Director since August 2020. Waverly holds a master’s in educational leadership and a master’s in special education both accredited from Grand Canyon University. He is also an alumnus East Stroudsburg University where he received his bachelor’s in Sociology.
Students are referred by their school district to attend High Road School. They are generally in grades 9–12 (aged 14 to 21) and face disabilities in a variety of areas, including Specific Learning Disability, Autism Spectrum Disorder, Intellectual Disability, Other Health Impairment, and Emotional Disability.
We are proud to employ certified special education teachers, TACT II trained staff (crisis intervention), Licensed Social Worker, speech language pathologist, and an occupational therapist.
Our program is able to provide a structured yet therapeutic environment for the students we serve. We have demonstrated the ability to work with a wide range of students with both academic and behavioral issues. The program provides a safe and personal environment where trusting relationships are established and student needs are addressed at an individual level.
Our students attended several learning-based field trips around Philadelphia throughout the 2017-2018 school year. We hosted speakers from various agencies from around the city that are geared towards helping our students get involved in job training/readiness programs.
Many of our students earned elective credits in a Career and Research Development course (CRD). In that course they learned about resume building, the job application process, and the interview process. Our staff helped students build resumes, apply for real jobs, and go through a mock interview process. Our students also participated in school related jobs such as breakfast/lunch delivery, cleaning/maintenance, and general office work. Through a partnership with OVR we brought in guest speakers to discuss topics related to job readiness and career development. We helped several of our students sign up for their services. Case Managers from Office of Vocational Rehabilitation will pick up students from our school and take them to interview for jobs and internships in the community. Office of Vocational Rehabilitation (OVR) and currently working with Horizon House in Philadelphia which offers a similar program for students with disabilities.
By focusing on key areas — academics, behavior modifications, support services, and transition / life planning services — we are able to meet the individual needs of all students through these varied approaches to instruction. Through collaboration with a student’s IEP team, we are able to choose the most appropriate learning model based on a given student’s present levels of performance, social capabilities, motor coordination, and ability to learn in a group setting.
Utilizing four specific instructional rotations, students are assessed academically, gain self-regulation skills, learn with district-aligned academic curriculums, and utilize integrated technology.
Serving students with significant autism and developmental disabilities, our model takes learned skills and practically applies them to the multiple environments in which a student would use those skills. Students spends portions of their day rotating through different modalities of instruction, the length and the frequency of each rotation is individuality designed for each learner and based on their current skills and future goals.
Each student enrolled in the model has individualized behavior programming which is driven by Functional Behavioral Assessments (FBA). We aim to identify the behaviors that continue to disrupt our student’s ability to access their environment and learning. We then use the data collected from the FBA and classroom data to device strategies that get to the root function of the students disrupted behaviors.
Specialized Education Services, Inc. (SESI), a division of FullBloom, is a premier provider of special education and alternative education services for K-12 students. SESI partners with 600+ districts across the country to meet the needs of 7,000+ students with learning disabilities and behavioral challenges through day schools and in-district classrooms.