At De Marillac, we believe a child’s ability to learn is affected by social, emotional, health and economic factors outside the classroom. Our Student and Family Services fosters success for our students, promoting healthier lifestyles and a positive school climate through our counseling and family programs. Through these programs, we provide support to students and families to ensure academic and personal growth.
Student, Graduate, and Family Services
The Student, Graduate, Family Service Department was established to create a stronger, streamlined 15-year model for our students, graduates, and family engagement. This restructure streamlines the services and position functions across the departments/program areas while increasing the clinical experience on the team.
De Marillac Academy holistically approaches our students, graduates, and families. Therefore, the Wellness Team provides wrap-around services that support the emotional and physical well-being of current students, graduates, and families.
The Wellness Team meetings' importance is to provide services and support systems by collaboratively working and evaluating each student, graduate, and family's needs. The Wellness Team supports our students and graduates' academic and social-emotional success through their educational journey at DMA, High School, Post-Secondary, and beyond.
Graduate Support Program
The Graduate Support Program is central to the 15-year youth development model of De Marillac Academy. The vision is to focus the programming and staff services on consistent, personalized support of positive youth development (both individual and academic) throughout the crucial developmental years of DMA graduates. The main program goals are to provide personalized support and exposure to meaningful opportunities and to build transferable academic and life skills that students, graduates, and families can build upon.
At the Academy level, Graduate Support collaborates with the Academy leadership to work directly with students in the classroom and engage families through family workshops and consultations with the Academy student services staff. These integrations into the Academy experience and the relationships that are built with students and families are the foundation for Graduate Support to accompany graduates and families through important life and academic transitions and milestones during adolescence.
Wellness
Our work starts with the well-being of our students in all aspects of their development. For this reason, DMA has a Counseling and Wellness department that offers personal and academic support services for our students. These services include personal and group counseling, speech and language therapy, occupational therapy, and psychological and educational testing. Students can be referred for these services by a family member or teacher; they may also self-refer.
The counseling time is conducted on-site and integrated into the school day, so families won’t have the added task of taking their children to appointments around the city. As students transition to high school, DMA creates a wellness plan with the families to ensure that services and support continue.
Aligned with the California Standards for School Counseling, our program:
Engages, advocates for and supports all students in learning
Plans, implements and evaluates programs to promote academic, career, personal and social development of all students
Utilizes multiple sources of information to monitor and improve student behavior and achievement
Collaborates and coordinates with school and community resources
Promotes and maintains a safe learning environment for all students
Family Partnership
Family involvement in the educational process is a crucial factor for children to achieve academic success. At De Marillac, we provide family support throughout the school year to increase the likelihood of student and family success. De Marillac offers individual, group, and family counseling and workshops for families. Recent workshops topics have included raising a teenager in the age of technology and recognizing bullying behaviors and parents as the primary educators. Additional community-building activities such as volunteering, holiday gatherings, potlucks, field trip chaperoning and family religious services help parents and guardians feel connected to their student and to the greater De Marillac community.
De Marillac Academy Family Council
To develop leadership for our parent community, De Marillac Academy has established a Family Council which meets monthly. This group size ranges from 8-12 families. In addition to attending the standard monthly meetings, they also advise our Principal and Family Partnership Coordinator during regular meetings. The Family Council acts as a voice for the larger family community and offers recommendations to the school administration.