Little City, Big Potential.

Nicole was going to sabotage her student. 

As a Board-Certified Behavior Analyst, Nicole was the first person from Little City’s Center for Education to see David in action when she went for an observation day at his home school district. She could see right away he needed routine and anything that threw off his schedule would cause behaviors and even aggression. 

So when David came to the Center for Education in June 2023, Nicole made sure David had a schedule. And then made sure it wasn’t always followed. 

“We tried to sabotage his schedule early on just to see how he handled it. We wanted to work through those barriers right away,” Nicole said. “And he ended up making a ton of progress in the first few months he was here.” 

David made so much progress that he ended up being one of the quickest turnarounds the school has experienced in years. He arrived in June 2023 and said goodbye to Little City in December 2024 as he moved on to the special education program at his local high school. 

Nicole said staff at the Center for Education provide every student with a highly individualized approach that helps them work toward the least restrictive environment, whether that is a return to their home school district or simply becoming more independent at Little City’s school. 

For David, it was clear he had the potential to return to his home school district and that challenging him early and often would turn his weakness into his comfort zone. 

“If you know something will trigger a behavior in a student, you sometimes want to draw that out on purpose so they experience it and you can begin to show them how to regulate emotion and respond in a different and more productive way,” Nicole said. “David had a lot of rigidity and couldn’t handle changes in his schedule. He had some aggression when he first started, but the more we gave him those hiccups in his schedule, the more he learned how to adapt.” 

After one year at Little City’s school, David was already showing incredible progress and independence. Though many students have one-to-one aides at the school, that is not something they would receive at their home school district. David started doing simple things like going from the bus to the classroom without an aide. While it made him nervous at first, he was able to do it and soon rarely needed an aide at all. 

Nicole said there was one incident near the end of his time at the school when she knew David was ready for his home school district. The class was getting loud and off schedule one day and she could see David getting upset. But before he let it grow, he calmed down, requested a break and was able to go for a short walk to reset. Seeing him work through that process without any help was a major breakthrough and difference from when he first started. 

Nicole said his visit to his local high school went incredibly well as he was clearly excited about everything around him and was even actively social with the other students. David had his last day at Little City at the end of December and has since found success in his new high school. 

Nicole said that the school’s program where a gen-ed student buddies with David for lunch, gym, and after-school activities will be especially helpful for David as he learns quickly and is able to model behaviors. 

Bre Reveley, Assistant Principal at the Center for Education, said David is the kind of success story they strive for with every student. 

“The goal is always to work toward the least restrictive environment for every student,” Bre said. “We want to give them the tools and mechanisms to be as independent as possible and David’s transformation really shows how capable these students are. We just need to help them reach the potential they already have.”