Washington State Archive

Q-and-A with Suzanne Savall, principal of trauma-informed elementary school in Spokane, WA

Suzanne Savall, principal of Otis Orchards Elementary. __________________ Suzanne Savall, principal of Otis Orchards Elementary School in Spokane’s East Valley School District, says she didn’t really know what she was signing up for, but the words “complex trauma” resonated with …

There’s no such thing as a bad kid in these six Spokane, WA, trauma-informed elementary schools

What’s a trauma-informed school? It’s a place where this happens: There’s this third-grade kid. Let’s call him Sam. He’s got ODD (oppositional defiant disorder…a misnomer for normal behavior a child exhibits when he’s living with chronic trauma). Nine-year-old Sam (not …