Ongoing Projects & Studies

Despite increased scholarly attention on classroom management, classroom management assessment, and consultation-based professional development activities, the availability of feasible, flexible and defensible classroom management assessments remains limited (Reddy, Fabiano, & Jimerson, 2013). Given the reported deficits in pre- and in-service professional development in conjunction with a growing emphasis on prevention within a tiered service delivery approach, coaches, consultants, and trainers are increasingly being called upon to support improvement in educator classroom management practice. Use of performance feedback and coaching incorporating screening and formative assessment data imbedded within a collaborative consultation framework attempt to shift professional development goals away from awareness-raising to behavior change (Mitchell et al., 2017; Reinke et al., 2008; Simonsen et al., 2017). The DBR-CM was developed to address the limited availability of feasible classroom management assessments.

PST 1-2-3 provides explicit yet flexible guidance to educators as they engage in team-based problem-solving and data-based decision-making activities to address challenges facing students, staff, classrooms, buildings, and districts within tiered service delivery models. PST 1-2-3 draws from core problem-solving components, behavioral consultation processes, and practical, real-world experiences to address frequent barriers to ineffectiveness and inefficient SB PST. PST 1-2-3 uses structured agendas, repetition and consistency, time limits, and deemphasis of prior training or experience to address barriers to success such as resistance, inconsistency, poor training, and lack of knowledge or skills relative to intervention, supports, data-collection, or problem-solving. Since initial pilot implementation in 2008, PST 1-2-3 has been refined through incorporating additional research and theory, feedback from users, and outcomes for students. The effectiveness of PST 1-2-3 is rooted in its unique features. PST 1-2-3 requires little training for most participants, it uses a consistent 3-meeting cycle, and activities are driven by simple, structured, time-bound agendas.  

School-Based Problem-Solving Teams (SB PST), in their varied forms and names, have played an important role in the progression of tiered service delivery models over time. Early forms of SB PST appeared as the first attempts to intervene in student difficulties outside of special education services (Burns & Symington, 2002). As their adoption and use have evolved, educators have relied heavily on these teams to execute components of a problem-solving process that underlie tiered service delivery models (e.g. RtI/MTSS). Despite widespread use of SB PST, the make up, processes, and outcomes of these teams has received relatively little scholarly attention (Burns & Symington, 2002; Hargreaves & Fullan, 2012; Rosenfield, Newell, Zwolski, & Benishek, 2018).  The little evidence available suggests that in the absence of explicit guidance and supervision of university sanctioned research efforts, the effectiveness of SB PSTs drop dramatically (Burns, Peters, & Noell, 2008). In order to improve the systematic and successful implementation of SB PST, current practices must be assessed and areas of need identified. This study served as an initial step in exploring current problem-solving team practices from the perspective of key school personnel. Patterns in educator reports related to implementation, processes, make up, and outcomes will be presented along with reported barriers to successful problem-solving team implementation. More specifically, this study investigated reports of implementation characteristics including team make up, member roles, and procedures as well as of targeted outcomes of SB PST across a Southeastern state. 

The development of the URP-WR is  grounded in the understanding that consumer subjective definition of a usable resources was likely, typically skewed towards accessibility. Usability more formally, refers to “the extent to which a system, product, or service can be used by the specified users to achieve specific goals with effectiveness, efficiency, and satisfaction in a specified context of use” (International Organization for Standardization, 2018). In other words, high usability means that the school psychologist is able to easily use and apply the recommendations provided in the resource to their setting with confidence. Low usability means that the school psychologist is unable to easily use the web resource, whether this be due to low quality recommendations, low quality evidence to support these recommendations, or the inaccessibility of the resource itself on the internet (i.e., one has to scroll through five pages of hits in order to find the resource). 

Initial development and validation efforts included an initial content validation procedure following by exploratory factor analytic and item reduction procedures using pilot study data. Analytic procedures resulted in 31 Likert scale (i.e., 0 to 6) items, across four domains, including accessibility, appearance, plausibility (which includes items relating to the feasibility of the recommendations as well as the credibility of the research supporting them), and system support (referring to the amount of support needed from a school or other system in order to use the resource effectively). The URP-WR exceeds the utility of other similar measures currently available (see Lydia M. Olsen Library, 2018; Schrock, 2019) as itallows users to engage in better digital citizenship practices, or more objectively and quantifiably evaluate and compare web-based EBP/I resources. Additionally, over time, accumulation and aggregation of consumer evaluations of web-based resources using the URP-WR would allow for new consumers an additional data source to use when evaluating web-based resources. In short, URP-WR scores could serve as a more objective version of a Yelp star system.

Overall, the URP-WR is a promising tool in development that aims to help school psychologists and educators make well-informed decisions regarding web resource selections in schools. The URP-WR seeks to (a) lessen the burden on practitioners by providing a tool to guide web resource selection and (b) narrow the research to practice gap through promotion and selection of evidence-based resources.  

Teachers play a critical role in supporting children, including those with chronically challenging health conditions. One such health condition that is particularly prevalent and impactful for students is Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD). A wealth of research documents a marked increase for risk of negative academic and social outcomes for students diagnosed with ADHD, including academic underachievement, failing grades, grade retention, suspensions, expulsions, school dropout, and peer rejection (DuPaul et al., 2016; McQuade & Hoza, 2015). All too often, the responsibility for implementing the classroom-based interventions designed to bolster the academic and behavioral success, and the socio-emotional development of children with ADHD in schools falls on classroom educators (i.e., general and special educators) and student support personnel (e.g., school psychologists, behavior support specialists). Unfortunately, despite high prevalence of students with ADHD in schools (Fabiano et al., 2013), it appears teachers are likely inadequately prepared to take on this role (Martinussen et al., 2011). As such, it is incumbent on districts, buildings, educators, and in-service trainers or consultants to support development of these skills for in-service educators. To add to available supplemental professional development materials related to identifying and supporting students with ADHD in educational settings, an online, self-paced professional development series was developed. This webinar was designed to develop knowledge and skill across several core competencies related to ADHD, including: (a) diagnostic symptoms, (b) multi-modal assessment of ADHD-related impairments, and (c) evidence-based interventions used to support students with ADHD. The webinar also aims to increase educator self-efficacy as it relates to supporting children with ADHD. Although focused on classroom educators, professional development content could also support knowledge and skill development for student support personnel.