New Report Discusses Ways to Improve
School Learning Conditions for Students and Staff. . . and How to
Break the "School to Prison" Link for Behaviorally
Challenging Students
Dear Colleagues,
I hope
you have been well during the past three weeks, and that (for most of you) the
end of the school year has gone smoothly. As for me, I spent three days
in San Francisco last month--presenting to over 400 participants at a three-day
conference focusing on school discipline and how to handle behaviorally
challenging students.
I also
just completed a brief for a due process case involving parents' right to get
an Independent Educational Evaluation at public expense, and have been on-site
consulting with a number of schools that had significantly high number of
office discipline referrals this past year, and want a better way to keep
students in class, positively engaged, and academically successful.
And so,
our topic/announcement for the day. . .
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
Today's Focus-- A New
National Report on School Discipline Just Announced
This
week, the Council of State Governments' Justice Center released a new report, The
School Discipline Consensus Report: Strategies from the Field to Keep
Students Engaged in School and Out of the Juvenile Justice System.
CLICK HERE FOR REPORT
This
report presents "a comprehensive set of consensus-based and field-driven
recommendations to improve conditions for learning for all students and
educators, better support students with behavioral needs, improve
police-schools partnerships, and keep students out of the juvenile justice
system for minor offenses." The Report identifies over two dozen
policy and 60 school-based recommendations to help keep more students in
productive classrooms and out of court rooms.
These
policies and recommendations are organized in six sections:
*
Conditions for Learning
*
Targeted Behavioral Interventions
*
School-Police Partnerships
*
Courts and Juvenile Justice
*
Information Sharing
*
Data Collection
Throughout the Report, it is emphasized that:
- Reactive, punishment-oriented, and zero tolerance programs do not work;
- What schools are doing in the areas of school discipline, classroom management, and student self-management also is not working; and
- We need to rethink our approach to "school discipline" using more proactive, field-tested, and outcome-based approaches.
Significantly, Project ACHIEVE and the importance of positive behavioral
support systems are referenced in the Report. I know that this Report is
one that every educator should review and consider--especially relative to ways
to put its various recommendations into practice.
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_
Considering Project ACHIEVE as
your School Discipline/Positive Behavioral Support Model
Project
ACHIEVE remains the only national, evidence-based school improvement
model that has both PBIS and multi-tiered Response-to-Intervention
components. Relative to school discipline, behavior management, and
student self-management, we focus heavily on prevention and early intervention
in order to minimize the need for suspensions, expulsions, alternative school
placements, and juvenile justice involvement.
In order
to shift toward prevention and intervention, districts and schools need
to:
*
Focus on teaching and reinforcing students' interpersonal, social problem
solving, conflict prevention and resolution, and emotional coping skills from
preschool through high school.
*
Do this by implementing a systematic "Health, Mental Health, and
Wellness" curriculum (to complement your literacy, math, science, and
other curricula).
*
"Job embed" the skills above into the classroom and academic
program-- teaching and reinforcing students for interacting successfully (a) on
an individual level, (b) in cooperative and other instructional groups and lab
experiences, and (c) within their classrooms, at their grade levels, and across
the school.
*
Integrate prosocial strategies and approaches into teachers' classroom
management systems, and evaluate them (through the district's teacher
evaluation system) for consistently using them.
*
Create a continuum of services, supports, strategies, and/or programs for
students (with disabilities, mental health issues, or who are just emotionally
or behaviorally struggling) that are implemented through an effective Student
Assistance Team process.
*
Plan, implement, and evaluate these approaches every year as part of the
school and district's strategic planning and School Improvement Plan processes.
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
Project ACHIEVE PBIS/School Discipline Planning and
Implementation Guidebook
For
almost 30 years and across the country, we have been helping schools and
districts with approaches that-- when implemented correctly and in a sustained
way-- have successfully improved school climate and safety, classroom
management and engagement, and students' prosocial and academic outcomes.
These
approaches also have been used--over the past decade--with the Arkansas
Department of Education through its State Improvement/Personnel Development
Grant (SIG/SPDG) with significantly positive results relative to positive
school climate, student classroom engagement, disproportionate office
discipline referrals and school suspensions, and academic achievement.
To help you understand these evidence-based approaches, we hope you will
download the FREE Positive Behavioral Support System Implementation Guidebook
that is available to you.
(Click
on the Link below; Find the document titled: PBSS School
Implement Fact Sheet)
CLICK HERE TO ACCESS RESOURCE
This
recently updated 100+ page resource has the following sections:
- The Components of an Effective Positive Behavioral Support System (PBSS)
- A Step-by-Step PBSS Implementation Blueprint
- Professional Development Approaches and Resources
- Evaluation and Outcomes
- Appendices
_ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _
I hope that you will download and read the new School Discipline Consensus
Report, and I invite you to look at the Project ACHIEVE PBSS resource above
as one way to implement many of recommendations in the Report.
Meanwhile for those of you who just finished your
school year, have a great break. For those of you still working (in
whatever capacity), I hope that you are successful, safe, and productive.
Best
wishes,
Howie
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