Get to know MDUSD's new Program Specialist Cynthia Remis

Tell us a little bit about your job I support students with special educational needs by supporting their team; parents, teachers, and administrators. Click here to know which sites Cynthia Remis covers. What inspired you to get into the field? I have always been drawn to helping those who, for some reason beyond their control, have been given extra challenges in life. What is your professional goal? Have you reached it? I would like to earn a doctorate in Educational Leadership. I have not yet reached that goal as all my extra funds have been handed over to the Regents of the University of California for my daughter's tuition at Santa Cruz. Thank goodness she is a senior! However, she is now applying for graduate schools, so Mom's plans may be put on hold awhile longer. What do you like best about your job? Seeing the fantastic work done with students by the teachers and assistants in our Special Education classrooms. Their caring and passion is extraordinary. If you could change anything about your job/services you provide what would it be? I would like to help improve the public's perceptions about the nature of work our teachers do, and have the public understand and appreciate the level of professionalism and expertise we have here in MDUSD. What are your hobbies/interests outside of work? I have many interests, particularly with anything that gets me into the great outdoors, such as hiking and biking. Indoors, I like to be creative with knitting and paper crafts. My favorite extracurricular activity is being a volunteer interpretive docent for the National Park Service at John Muir National Historic Site. It incorporates my love of the outdoors, my desire to volunteer for my country, and my interests in California history architecture, and conservation. Plus the uniform is pretty cool! (Although not as cool as the grey and green of a full-on NPS ranger!)

Get to Know MDUSD's New Program Specialist Avrilio Moumoutjis

Tell is a little bit about your job: As a Special Education Program Specialist, I have the honor of serving and supporting all stakeholders especially students through the Special Education process. What has inspired you to work in this profession? Helping people has always be a professional and personal goal of mine. It inspires me to help kids especially those with disabilities to be socially and academically successful. What is your professional goal? My goal is to develop student social and academic performance by supporting the IEP's team and process. What do you like best about your job? I enjoy the number of great people and students I interact with across multiple sites. If you could change anything about your job what would it be? I wouldn't change anything. I wish I had more time in the day to visit sites. Contact him at: Avrilio Moumoutjis, PhD moumoutjisa@mdusd.org (925) 682-8000 ext. 4505 Check out which Program Specialist covers your site, click here.

Get to Know MDUSD's New Program Specialist Shellie Higuera

As the new year starts we welcomed a few new staff to the special education department. We will be providing information on our new staff and what brought them to their new position in MDUSD. Below is an interview with Shellie Higuera, a Program Specialist for MDUSD that started this school year but has been with our District prior to her new position. Please describe your job and duties? My Program Specialist job responsibilities include servicing all the Non-Public Schools and County Schools within the Mt. Diablo Unified School District boundaries. I collaborate and coordinate with these schools to ensure that Special Education students are receiving educational opportunities tailored to meet their individual needs. We provide these educational opportunities in a least restrictive environment which advances educational benefit and growth, as well as, providing equity and access to curriculum. I attend IEP meetings and represent Mt. Diablo Unified School District as the Administrative designee. What inspired you to work in this profession? Coming from a blue-collar working class family, being the first person to graduate from college in my family, and being of Hispanic descent, education has always been valuable and important to me. Education has made a significant difference in my life, and it gives me great pleasure to give back to the community by helping students attain academic success. I am sensitive to the obstacles and barriers in overcoming challenges within the educational system and feel inspired to help others navigate through the system successfully. What is your professional goal? I have achieved two Masters degrees. My first Masters is in Behavioral Sciences, Bilingual Cross Cultural Education, Spanish. My second Masters degree is in Counseling, School Psychology. I do have thoughts of eventually earning a Doctorate Degree. What do you like best about your job? I love seeing students grow and develop their self-confidence in academics, social-emotional, and behavioral functioning. It is rewarding and fulfilling to me to see students feel good about themselves and their accomplishments. I also enjoy working with parents and helping them support their children. Being able to provide resources and guide student growth and achievement is a great feeling of success! If you could change anything about your job/services you provide, what would it be? There is nothing I would like to change about my job. I am very satisfied with my role. Contact her at: Shellie Higuera M.A. & M.S. higueras@mdusd.org 925-682-8000 ext. 4294 925-674-0667

Get to Know Program Specialist Jessica Garcia

1.  Tell us a little bit about your job

I am the Program Specialist for all of the Mental Health Collaborative Programs within the district, as well as, Seneca NPS and Marchus County Program.  I also lead the Triage Team. Working with the MHC Programs entail attending IEPs, providing guidance to the teachers and staff, collaborating with multiple community agencies, and most of all working towards providing quality mental health programs within the district that serve a multitude of student needs.

2.  What inspired you to get into the field?

Since I was young I wanted to teach and when I attended college for my undergrad in teaching a counselor recommended I complete the requirements for Special Education.  Through the fieldwork I was required to complete I was interested in the field immediately.  Once I was teaching in my own classroom I began working with students who had emotional needs and realized that the programs the districts provided for them needed improving and attention. That is when I began to gain more experience in the specific field and really started to be motivated by the students and families that I worked with to better our schools.

3.  What is your professional goal? Have you reached it?

My professional goal was to work in a leadership role in Special Education while working in the community that I live and raise my child in, so I guess with this new position I have achieved it! It's time to set another goal for myself now!

4.  What do you like best about your job?

Other then the families and students always keeping me on my toes, I have loved the people that I am working with in MDUSD.  I feel that there is a level of professionalism and genuine interest in the work that I love. Everyone has been very helpful and welcoming to me. It has all been greatly appreciated.

5.  If you could change anything about your job/services you provide what would it be?

To balance my time more efficiently.  It is a common theme among educators that there is not enough time in the day and still is true in this position. I am hoping that by next school year when things are not as new I can create a more efficient schedule for myself.

6.  What are your hobbies/interests outside of work?

I have a son that is six months old so right now any time I get outside of work is focusing on my new family and our time together.  I love to be outdoors and travel as well so any opportunity I get for that I embrace!

Get to Know Program Specialist Hunt Lin

1. Tell us a little bit about your job

I'm the Program Specialist for 8 elementary schools (El Monte, Hidden Valley, Monte Gardens, Mountain View, Pleasant Hill Elem, Sequoia Elem, Westwood and Wren), two middle (El Dorado and Sequoia Middle), one high school (Concord High), alternative high school programs (Summit/Nueva Vista), and Contra Costa County Office of Education programs (Mauzy, Los Cerros and Green Valley Elem). I support the teachers and administrators at these schools by providing them trainings, consultation and attending complicated IEP meetings.

1. What inspired you to get into the field?

Right after I graduated from UC Irvine, I got a job as a classroom aide in a special education school. I really enjoyed working with children with exceptional needs and continue to pursue in a career to help children and families.

1. What is your professional goal?  Have you reached it? 

My professional goal is to either become a professor at an University or to become a SELPA director. I have not reached the goal yet. My main focus right now is to be a loving husband to my wife and a great father to my 22 months old son.

1. What do you like best about your job?

Working with my colleagues to help students and families.

1. If you could change anything about your job/services you provide what would it be? 

I really enjoy training principals, teachers and aides and I wish I had more time and opportunities to do this.

1. What are your hobbies/interests outside of work? 

I love spending time with my family.

Get to Know Your District Series: Meet Program Specialist Carrie Weil

1. Description of job and responsibilities:

As a Program Specialist, my job is to support various school sites, their Special Education departments, and mental health programs throughout the district. I travel to the sites, facilitate IEP meetings, provide site support and staff development opportunities, and attend monthly meetings with various service providers.

2. What inspired me to enter this profession?

As a Resource Specialist in the district, I found my passion inworking with students with special needs. I want to continue to work in this field while focusing on mental health concerns and providing support to teachers.

3. What is your professional goal?

My goal is continue to work as a Special Education administrator in the district and perhaps continue my education by getting my doctorate in Special Education.

4. What do you like best about your job?

I enjoy visiting school sites and working with teachers and staff to ensure that the needs of all our students are met.

5. If you could change anything about your job/services you provide,what would it be?

I love working in education and I hope that it becomes a priority in our state. We need to invest more in our children's education to ensure that they become happy, healthy, and productive members of society.

6. What is your contact information?

Phone: (925) 628-3104

Email: weilc@mdusd.k12.ca.us

Get to Know Your District-Sharon Krell

1. Description of the job and responsibilities

I am the program specialist for the Clayton Valley feeder pattern which includes Diablo View MS, Pine Hollow MS, Ayers, Eagle Peak, Highlands, MDE and Silverwood. I attend meetings important to the school sites in which they feel they may need district support. I work with the schools to create site-based opportunities to help special education students. I also help clarify available district programs, and interpret special education laws at team meetings. I help develop and present teacher in-service training for new teachers, for veteran teachers and for administrators each year. I also assist in finding placements for students new to the district or for students moving from one site to another by working with Program administrators on a weekly basis.

I am also the Extended School Year Coordinator. I develop the entire program: selecting sites, working with transportation on times, entering transportation data, setting up classes, enrolling students, training principals and working with personnel to hire staff.


2. What inspired you to work in this profession?

As a middle school student, I used to help my mother, a high school English teacher, correcting papers for her students and we would talk about different parts of her school day. Her enthusiasm sparked a desire to become a teacher, but I chose elementary school as my first choice, rather than high school. I landed in special education by default because when I graduated college, the only available positions were in special education. As soon as I spent a few weeks in the classroom, however, I knew this was where I was supposed to be and I have never looked back. I have worked with mentally retarded students, learning handicapped students, students multiple handicaps and gifted students and I have loved it all and always learned something from my students with each passing year.

3. What is your professional goal?

As a new teacher, for 9 years, my goal was to help my students become all they could be by learning new things and finding different ways to present information so each year was something different. Standards, benchmarks and grade level curricula were unknowns at the time. One day an administrator from a different site approached me and asked if I would like to become a resource specialist at his school. Off in a new direction I went. I worked in a low income elementary school, moved to a high income neighborhood school, moved from LA to the East Bay and worked as a middle school resource specialist. I also became very involved in activities at the site and decided I would like to be an administrator in that District and I returned to school to get my administrative credential. That was 11 years ago, and I haven’t looked back!

4. What do you like best about your job?

The best thing about my job is that no two days are the same; each day brings new activities and new challenges. I like going to work each day and wondering how the day will turn out. I am frightfully busy and my days just fly by.


5. If you could change anything about your job/services you provide, what would it be?

I miss having connections with students and I would change that if I could. As an administrator not attached to a site, I don’t get the opportunity to closely interact with students and parents anymore. So, periodically, I have to go visit classes just because…


6. Contact information: Tel and email
Sharon Krell
Program Specialist/ESY Coordinator
682-8000, 4189
348-1757 Cell

Get To Know Your District – Melody Royal, Program Specialist

(Full interview HERE)
Could you please tell me about your job?

I’m a program specialist. I work a lot with families and help them understand their IEP’s, make sure that there are no paper errors. Right now, we just switched to a new form, so there is a big learning curve.

One of the things that I do, that I really, really like, is at North Gate High School. Every Monday, their special ed staff gets together for lunch and they invited me. So I go and I listen and if there’s anything they need, or that they need more training on or more information on, they give it to me- and that’s my job. Then, I give it back to them on the following Monday. So, that’s very proactive. They’ve really grown a lot.

I also am the program specialist for all the Spectrum Autism Collaborative, which means I’m a case manager for all those kids. I think collaboratives are wonderful. They’re working so well for the kid’s that are in there. They’re program matches them perfectly.

It’s really a liaison between the administration offices and the school site. I have one more school added, Strandwood (Elementary School), and I really like working with the principal. One of the things I did, just to try to offer them support, is - every administrator has to sit in on the Administrative Hearing Panel. So, I offered to sit in for the Principal of Elementary because they don’t have any other administrators.


What inspired you to even get into this field?

Well, my Masters (degree) is actually in Social Welfare, but I really like how social welfare does blend with education. One of our student projects, we had to go through job interviews and decide on somewhere we thought we would like to go. So, I saw Dr. (Mildred) Brown and told her, “I would like to be a program specialist” and she said, “Melody, you know, you’re just not ready.” That’s when the Parent Liaison (position) was coming up. She said, “Why don’t you start to attend the board meetings to see if you hear anything that interests you.” So, I started to going to the board meetings and at one board meeting I heard it (the Parent Liaison position) and so then I just kind of latched on (to the position.)

What is your professional goal? Have you reached it?

Uh- uh. I’m a life-long learner. I just got my People/Personnel Services credential in December. So I went back to school for that. In January, I’m planning on going back to school to get my Master’s in Autism. So, I have this urge to go to school – always.

As far as the District goes, I did summer school at Alliance and that was fun - not last summer but the summer before that (Melody clarifies.) I love being with the kids. I absolutely loved it. Those are some pretty unique kiddos that they’ve got over there and they were great.

So, after you get your Master’s, what are you going to do with that?

I think that it will just help me be more effective with the autism program. That is where the growth area is in the district. Right now, I do all the Spectrum collaboratives. Well, in the future, we might not have the Spectrum collaborative because we will have our own classrooms. So, I would like to be the program specialist for those classrooms.

What do you like best about your job?

I really, really like the people I work with. We have lost some really good people in the district this year. I respect them, they are good to work with. We have interest in common and a single vision. I like knowing that I’m doing something that is going to make a difference in a kid’s life. I like going to the annual IEP and seeing the progress.

I enjoy my job. I really do. I look forward to it. When it presents a challenge, I look forward to fixing it.

If you could change anything about your job or services you provide, what would it be?

The one thing is that the MGT report that we did said that there should be 9 program specialists. If I could change anything, it would be to find the funding for 9 program specialists because then we would be able to support our sites better. We are stretched. I have 15 elementary schools, 2 middle and one high (school.) There is one program specialist that has 3 high schools. My cell phone is one my business card, I do email and I’m always trying to keep everyone in the loop of what is going on. I try to be as accessible as possible, return those emails in 48 hours maximum- I returned all my phone calls yesterday and people were shocked, “I can’t believe you called me back today!”

If we had the full compliment of program specialists, we would be able to do more staff development. We’re using new IEP forms now. There is a training process, but no “hands on.” I went to an IEP yesterday, the teacher was so cute, she had all these Stickies on the IEP- what she didn’t know how to answer. We’re used to a 4 page facesheet. It (the new IEP form) lines up with the State, so that’s good. I told you about the Northgate meetings? They asked me to bring a completed IEP form to see what it’s supposed to look like.

I wonder what parents could do to help with that (new IEP process?)

What would be a really good activity is that they (the parent’s) could take their kid’s IEP and transfer it on the new form so that they know where to find the information. This isn’t the real IEP that they’re using, but they’re familiarizing themselves with the form- so they know where things are. Believe me, nothing, nothing is familiar about these forms. Where’s the kid’s name? Oh, there it is. Where’s the kid’s birth date? Oh, it’s on this page. MIS will not accept the old forms.
(Updated IEP docs HERE)

Contact information: Melody G. Royal, M.S.W., Program Specialist
royalm@mdusd.k12.ca.us
925-682-8000 ext.4186

Get to Know Your District Series: Meet Program Specialist Samantha Espinosa

1. Description of the job and responsibilities:

Samantha Espinosa is Program Specialist, Bridge Program Administrator and Workability Coordinator.

Program Specialists role is to help support site staff with problematic situations, facilitate communication between site and district, answer questions or find answers. As Bridge Administrator Samantha supervises staff of the Bridge Program, it is a program for 18 – 22 year old students with severe disabilities. Her role as Workability Coordinator supervises the staff that provide assistance in planning and implementing services leading to successful student transition to employment.

2. What inspired you to work in this profession?

Samantha has always wanted to help others and make a difference, Special Education has provided her many opportunities to do that.

3. What is your professional goal?

To be the best at what I do, to keep growing and learning.

4. What do you like best about your job?

The best part about my job is being able to see the positive effects of my actions on the students, I love to see them smile when it finally clicks or they feel like their needs are being met.

5. If you could change anything about your job/services you provide, what would it be?

Clone myself so I can be in multiple places at once or so I can truly multi-task.

6. What is your contact info?

Phone: (925) 798 – 1299
Email: espinosas@mdusd.k12.ca.us

Meet Berry Murray

What inspired you to work in this profession?
I had been a Speech and Language Pathologist for about 25 years when I came to California and Mt. Diablo Unified. I was sooo ready for new challenges and I felt I could really make a difference as a Special Education Administrator.

What is your professional goal?
I have achieved my professional goal. When I interviewed for my Speech Pathologist position 12 years ago with Carol Manning I thought to myself: "that looks like a great job". I worked hard as a Program Specialist, even harder as a Principal and now I have the honor to be the Program Administrator for Resource and Related Services.

What do you like best about your job?
Being a support for my teachers and Speech Pathologists. I believe that if they know they can always call me to help them with whatever they need, then they can relax and do a great job for their students.

If you could change anything about the services you provide what would it be?
I would find more time for teacher training. It is vital to keep teachers and related service providers up to date on special education information and the latest in educational strategies and methodologies. Everyone is working so hard, it is difficult to find time for this but I am devoted to staff development.

You can contact Berry at 682-8000 ext. 4065 or murrayb@mdusd.k12.ca.us.

Meet Sharon Krell

Please describe your job and responsibilities.
You can read my job description HERE. I ’m responsible for CMA trainings/testing in the district and I coordinate and set up and supervise the ESY program by working with personnel and principals to hire needed staff.

What inspired you to work in this profession?
I always wanted to teach, my mother was a teacher, but I didn’t get interested in special education until I took some college classes. One of the most rewarding things for me is to know I made a difference, big or small, in someone’s life. I also feel rewarded when parents take time to say thank you.

What is your professional goal?
Professional goal to me, means something entirely different than to most people. It’s not about being the top administrator somewhere. It’s being professional, maintaining my integrity by being honest, following through on things I say I will do in a timely manner. I work hard to follow through and check back in with people even when I am no longer needed.

What do you like best about your job?
That each day is different. It certainly is never boring or dull. I like to keep busy and my days just fly by.

If you could change anything about your job, what would it be?
I have too much to do and not enough help or time. Ideally, my wish would be to have a secretary for ESY support, and to have 3 more program specialists to assist with the workload. Then I would have time to be at my sites more to get to know students, be in classes and do more in service training.

You can contact Sharon at: krells@mdsud.k12.ca.us or 682-8000x4189 or 348-17577.