Schoolwide Screening and Positive Behavior Supports

Abstract

As schoolwide positive behavior supports (PBS) become more commonplace in public schools, efficiently and effectively identifying and supporting students who are at risk for school failure has become increasingly important. This descriptive study examines the functioning of 72 students identified as at risk in 3 elementary schools with established PBS systems, using schoolwide screening, rating scale instruments, and office discipline referrals. The students were identified through the use of the Systematic Screening for Behavior Disorders (Walker & Severson, 1992) administered in the fall. School teams matched the identified students to existing supports and tracked their functioning twice monthly. Teachers completed the Social Skills Rating System (Gresham & Elliot, 1990) on each of the students in the following spring. The number of office discipline referrals for each student was monitored, as was the number of students referred to school-based support teams—such as a Student Study Team, a Functional Behavior Assessment Team—and the number of students who qualified for special education that year. Results suggest that students at risk for school failure are best identified by monitoring office discipline referrals and the use of a systematic schoolwide screening process.

Psychometric analysis of the BASC–2 Behavioral and Emotional Screening System (BESS) student form: Results from high school student samples.

“…This hypothesis, however, re mains to be empirically tested. Second, the purpose of screening is to detect risk; not make diagnostic decisions (Walker et al, 2005). Third, the purpose of this and prior studies was to ensure that the BESS include broad enough item coverage to enhance detection of (Kamphaus & Reynolds, 2007).…”

Comparison of Universal Mental Health Screening to Students Already Receiving Intervention in a Multitiered System of Support

“…However, despite their predictive validity, ODRs do not detect a full range of emotional and behavioral problems. ODRs are more highly correlated with externalizing behavior problems (e.g., disruptive behavior, attention problems) than with other behavioral and mental health problems (e.g., concentration problems, depression, anxiety, adaptive skills; Walker, Cheney, Stage, Blum, & Horner, 2005). The reliance on ODRs to identify at-risk students places the focus primarily on students with externalizing behavior problems, passing over students at risk of internalizing behavior concerns (Walker et al, 2005).…”

“…Behavioral risk has also been found to increase or intensify over time with students identified in kindergarten with any mental health symptom experiencing the greatest impairment by Grade 5 (Essex et al, 2009). With regard to school functioning, students at risk of mental health problems tend to be absent from school more often and have more disciplinary problems than those rated in the normal range on measures of emotional and behavioral risk (Gall, Pagano, Desmond, Perrin, & Murphy, 2000; Walker et al, 2005). To better inform implementation procedures of UMHS, research is needed extending the work of Eklund and Dowdy (2014) to include these risk indicators with a larger, real-world sample in schools implementing UMHS school-wide.…”

Using Universal Screening for Early Identification of Students at Risk: A Case Example from the Field

“…Students' unmet mental health needs are a substantial concern. Each year, 14-20% of youth are diagnosed with mental, emotional, or behavioral mental health disorders (National Academy of Sciences, 2009), which often manifest as internalizing or externalizing behaviors (Forns, Abad, & Kirchner, 2014;Lane et al, 2012;Walker et al, 2005). Despite the prevalence of mental health disorders in youth, only 45% of youth with a mental health diagnosis receive treatment, and only 24% of those individuals receive care in the school system (Costello, He, Sampson, Kessler, & Merikangas, 2014).…”