Student Assistance Pajaro Valley Prevention and
UPDATE
335 East Lake Avenue
Watsonville CA, 95076
Contact Phone: (831) 728-6445
Website: http://www.pvpsa.org
Details: Pajaro Valley Prevention and Student Assistance (PVPSA) is a nonprofit agency dedicated to providing education, training, and counseling and prevention services to students, families, and staff of the Pajaro Valley Unified School District (PVUSD). By helping prevent criminal behavior, gang involvement, truancy and school dropout, and drug, alcohol, and tobacco use, PVPSA improves the quality of life in our community and its schools. PVPSA was created as one of the first models of a nonprofit agency dedicated to providing services to a school district. The story began in 1984 when the PVUSD established an Office for Drug and Alcohol Prevention and Student Assistance to serve its students. Linda Perez, Founding Director of PVPSA, was hired to coordinate the program, and it quickly began to make a difference. After twenty years of service and a successful conclusion of the Safe Schools/Healthy Students Initiative, Linda Perez was ready to begin a new adventure. Three years earlier, the PVPSA Board of Directors identified Jenny Sarmiento as the next director of the agency and developed a succession plan. In 2008, Jenny became the second chief executive officer to lead PVPSA and continue the collaborations with community partners to keep kids safe and in school. During the early years, the district had been issuing five-day suspensions to students caught with drugs on campus; however, this punishment was not working to discourage drugs on campus. PVPSA developed a school-based student assistance program that kept the students on campus and in class, with support and supervision. Evaluations documented that this approach worked well with fewer repeat offenders. One of the keys to the success of the program was the participation of master-level interns from Bay Area colleges and universities. As the program grew, a more efficient way of managing it was needed. A blue-ribbon committee of 25 community leaders and school district executives was formed, and the committee developed a proposal that created many far-reaching benefits. It recommended that the prevention programs be separated from the school district and run under the umbrella of a dedicated nonprofit agency that would focus exclusively on PVUSD. The idea was that such an organization would have greater flexibility. It could receive funds from the school district, county, state, and federal government; and it could also apply for private foundation grants. Such an organization could also serve as a conduit to bring together a broad range of stakeholders including PVUSD, law enforcement, the courts, the city, and the county. That is exactly what has happened. PVPSA has flourished, and the students of PVUSD and the community have benefited greatly. PVPSA has become a model dedicated nonprofit organization. In fact, it has literally "written the book" on the subject, having put together a guidebook through a grant from the U.S. Department of Education.