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School Psychologist for School District 57 (Prince George) Olivia Lestideau, B.Sc., M.Ed.
Find out more about her exciting career and contributions by clicking below My Job
Job Description: I work as part of a multidisciplinary team of education professionals for the betterment of students and families.
Day in the life of your position: I don’t think I can describe a typical day as my activities and schedule are quite dependent on the school year. A sample day where things aren’t too hectic involves coming into the office and, after checking my phone messages, select some test kits and meet with a student in one of the nine schools I handle for an assessment. After whatever time I can manage for a lunch break, I head back to my office here at Quinson Elementary in Prince George and wrap up the assessment by analyzing the results and creating a report on the testing activities. When a school day is over, I usually meet with teachers, other Area Support Team staff and parents for results sharing meetings or problem-solving meetings.
Whoa, that is quite the day! Let’s start from the beginning, what’s involved in an assessment? That varies on a case-by-case basis. We have a large variety of activities for the student to take. I can assess numerous areas of functioning and skill, and have numerous tests I can use for this. The tests are done one-on-one in a quiet room with no distractions. We’ll take breaks whenever the child needs one. All the tests are standardized and comprise of discreet activities so they don’t last too long.
Do your students know they are being assessed? Yes, but because the tests are so well designed, they aren’t usually like regular academic tests. Most of our students think of them more as games. If the kids are old enough, I let them know the purpose of the assessment, which is to get to know them and how they’ll best be able to learn in school. We always reiterate that everyone has strengths and weaknesses, and I want to identify their strengths.
What about the afternoon stuff? What do you need to do after an assessment? I’ll usually score the tests when I get back. As with most analytical work, raw test scores need to be converted and made sense of. I’ll usually make comparisons with other students’ progress and report on the results. Essentially, this part of my job is synthesizing the big picture of the students’ strengths and struggles. Based on the results, I’ll make intervention program recommendations.
Are you involved with the intervention? I don’t usually administer the intervention activities – that’s something that is more appropriate for school staff to do. Other professionals in the school district, like Speech Pathologists, will administer interventions themselves.
What about those teams, who would be involved in that? Extended School Based Teams usually comprise of Teachers, Principals, School Psychologists, Speech-Language Pathologists, Occupational Therapists, District Behaviour Interventionists, and Aboriginal Education Social Workers. We will have a meeting once a month with each school team. At these meetings, I’ll get a sense of whether the child in question is a good candidate for testing. From there, I’ll call the parents and see if they’re willing to allow an assessment to take place. It is quite rare for them to say no, but it does happen.
My Career
You said earlier that your day is also dependent on the school year, what changes come with the seasons? The first month of school is extremely busy! We have a funding deadline from the Ministry of Education at the end of September to provide a list of how many students have special needs and need specific supports, which means we need to do A LOT in those first four weeks. October through December is fairly manageable, but then we have a rush right in January and February again, because we have that same deadline at the end of February. March to April can be fairly hectic as well as we help children who are transitioning from the Child Development Centre and Aboriginal Head Starts into Kindergarten. June also creates a flood of activity as we work with children moving from elementary to junior high school and then from junior high to high school.
Typical issues you tackle: The students I help are those who are not doing well in school, either because of academic hurdles or behavioral or emotional hurdles. More of an organizational hurdle in this profession is when we deal with a lot of different agencies who have different “language” for the same thing it’s sometimes hard to communicate “jargon” to a variety of offices.
Hugest hurdle you’ve had to overcome: The hugest hurdle I think anyone faces in a profession like this is making the transition from studies to work. It’s much easier to think clearly about theories, but applying them in everyday practice is a whole new challenge.
What tools do you need to succeed at your job? Self care is the number one quality you need in this job – both personally and professionally. You need to keep up-to-date with the science of school psychology and know of new practices and findings in the profession. You also need the opportunity to consult with your peers in the field. Another thing you really need is current tests. When a test becomes out of date, the findings aren’t valid and it becomes a real ethical problem to continue to use it.
What’s the best thing about your job? Each case I get is different and my range of duties is very broad, so every day really is quite different. There are daily opportunities to learn new things.
My History
How’d you get into this as a career? My interests brought me here. My mother had a day care in our home and my brother had special needs growing up. I grew up close to this field by virtue of experience and I was interested in it as a profession. It’s a lot like being a detective – you find the source of a problem by pulling layers back.
What's been your career path thus far? I started out working in residential group homes with high risk youth and volunteered as a peer counselor at UNBC while completing my undergrad. After that, I went to U of A to complete my Master’s and I was hired six months before graduation.
Major projects you’ve accomplished: I’m in the mindset that every time I help a child learn, that’s a major accomplishment. I’m also a district partner for POPFASD – a provincial program that every school has someone involved with. Their head office is actually in Prince George, and I helped to develop an interactive group activity to help teachers and educational staff to deepen their knowledge of how prenatal exposure to alcohol affects the brain. We piloted the project in the spring, and we’ll be doing it again in the fall.
My Thoughts
What value does your job bring to BC? Schools are the one of the most common source of free psychological services for our community. Being available is one of the best things I can bring the community. Also, because we work with other professionals (like teachers), we’re able to collaborate in teams and provide support to families on an on-going basis. Personally, being in the rural north, I take pride in being available locally. Otherwise, most families would have to go down to Vancouver to get the same services.
What do you think is in the future for BC? It’s hard to say right now, but I think things are looking bright. At the moment, a lot of things are being developed at the expense of social services. We’re feeling deep cuts in education and health right now. This is really problematic because the health of the province really depends on the well being and knowledge of the citizens who live here.
What is the value of Professionals to BC? We’re a group of people who have spent the extra time and resources to get expertise in something that can bring immense benefit to the people of BC. We use that expertise to provide valuable services to British Columbia.
What does the phrase Professionals Making a Difference in BC mean to you? Our work makes a difference to a lot of people on a daily basis.
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