Nathan Z Phelps

I hold a master of arts in teaching in special education with an emphasis in behavioral emotional disorders from the University of North Carolina at Charlotte, as well as a North Carolina and Tennessee standard professional teaching license in special education: K-12 general curriculum.

Some of my achievements in the field of special education for the past 9 years as a special education teacher and in educational management are as follows:

•  Recognized by North Carolina Department of Public Instruction as having one of the most well-developed behavior management programs throughout the state
• Increased my students' end-of-grade test scores by 26% the first year of teaching in North Carolina
• Restructured a public separate program for high at-risk special education students that resulted in me implementing a certified therapeutic dog to increase student attendance and lower suspension rates among violent youth enrolled in the program
• Appointed interim assistant principal for six months until school secured a permanent hire
• Recipient of a system-wide runner-up “teacher of the year” award in North Carolina

From 2006 to 2011, I was employed with the Rowan-Salisbury School System (RSS) in North Carolina as a lead behavior specialist coordinator.  While employed for RSS, I successfully decreased the suspension rate of exceptional children from 3% to .02%, increased the department’s behavioral grant from $70, 000 to $199,760-which resulted in the department hiring a second behavior specialist, a social worker, secured over $12,000 in sliver grants for the autism problem solving team (AUPST) and the positive behavior intervention support initiative and appointed AUPST team leader for which I developed an iPad program for adaptive teachers.  Although I attained much success in education, I realized the aspects of my work I found most rewarding were providing direct job-coaching/counseling services to teachers and dealing with more human resource related functions, which has prompted me to seek a higher education or human resource position.

Previous professional experiences encompass over four years in the mental health arena, where I worked with juvenile sex-offenders in a psychiatric treatment facility and as a behavioral health technician in an outdoor therapeutic program with adolescents who had chemical dependency and various psychological issues.  On a personal note, I have been happily married for over 15 years and have two children and enjoy rock climbing, kayaking, mountain biking, backpacking and competitive running.

Please see the sidebar links for additional materials that range from in-service trainings that I conducted, sample of my behavioral observations through the use of a competing pathway model, automated behavioral recording systems that I designed in Excel, an alternative middle school program manual that I wrote, to the positive behavior support section that includes all behavioral safeguards I developed for the department’s administrative manual.


Thanks for stopping by!
-Nathan