♪♪♪ Alicia: Hi, guys.

How are you all doing?

Students: Good.

Alicia: Okay, we're going to get started in a second.

Do you want to start with a deep breath?

Alicia: My name is Alicia Garoupa, and Im honored to serve as Chief of Wellbeing and Support Services for Los Angeles County Office of Education.

Were going to take a deep breath in... (inhales) and blow it out (exhales) The Chief of Wellbeing and Support Services was a position that was created in January of 2022.

Um, I was selected for the position and I am the first person to occupy this role.

So, I think my position was created to really ensure that in education we're centering the needs of those that we serve, which are our students, our families and our educators, and bringing services and supports to where... to where they are, which is to schools.

So, the three prongs to my job really are, um, our community schools initiative, which is basically a way that we're transforming schools to serve as hubs in the community.

My second area of focus is what's called Student Support Services that support things like child welfare and attendance, school mental health and counseling programs, foster youth services, services for our kids who are experiencing homelessness and their families.

And third, um, I oversee our employee assistance service for educators.

That's our EASE program.

>>: Slowly and gently, when you are ready... Alicia: So, we're at John Glenn High School.

Um, and John Glenn is a great example of a partnership between our County Office of Education and the Norwalk Lamarrada Unified School District.

So, the thrift store on campus helps to address an unmet need.

We do have a large number of students on campus who identify as experiencing homelessness.

And they provide a... a drop in space for students and programming that supports counseling, mental health needs, creates a space for, um, youth, um, to drop in as needed.

What I hear from students is that we need to listen to them.

We need to identify alternative approaches, not just a 50 minute, you know, clinical counseling session.

Alicia: All these systems that we create the supports and programs we put in place, they need to meet your needs.

They need to make sense to you.

I can say my position was created to support the well-being of everyone.

If our youth are gonna be well, we need our adults to be well also, um, both because they serve as a model and also because their coping, uh, impacts our youths coping.

So, I think the Employee Assistance Service is an example of how, um, our county office is committed to supporting the well-being of adults.

>>: Inhale that cool air and nurture yourself with it.

Alicia: It is a specialized employee assistance service that provides 24-hour hotline access to, um, counseling and then, um, short-term counseling services for district employees and their family members.

What I like about my job is that I get to engage with students directly.

I get to engage with educators, I get to engage with family members and caregivers and hear directly from them.

And I get to try to build bridges between the decision makers to ensure that we're centering what our students, families and schools say that they need.

In my ideal world, I would work myself out of a job, right?

That there would be such seamles integration services so effectively in place and our kids needs and their families would be met through the work that we're doing here.