School-Wide System of Support

I have worked in a school with PBIS (positive behavior interventions and support) and MTSS (multi-tiered systems of support) for my entire career. The successes of this program are many, in my opinion. The first success is that more students are able to receive targeted support because every teacher in the building is essentially a part of the support team for all students. We have "Bobcat Bucks" at our school and teachers use these buck to reward good behavior. On Fridays, students can use the "ROAR store" to buy small trinkets and items, so there is some superficial motivation for students, especially our 6th and 7th graders. One of my favorite aspects of our PBIS program and the Bobcat Bucks is that we have a holiday ROAR store. Students come to the holiday ROAR store to purchase gifts for their families for the holidays. We even have parents and student volunteers who gift-wrap for students. Some of our students come from families who struggle financially, and it is truly special to watch these students purchase real gifts for their families based on the bucks they earn by being good students and school citizens. We also have a video productions class and we air daily announcements through this program. We use this class to motivate and for "positive subliminal messaging" of good ROAR behaviors. This helps support our schoolwide goals to encourage and expect the best from all of our students. We have academic support classes as a part of the MTSS work our school does, so students who are academically low in ready and math are double-dipped in those intervention classes each day to gain more than a year's growth and climb back to grade level. We also offer classes before the school day for this reason.

Some drawbacks to these programs is just how intense they are, and the amount of time and energy it takes to be thorough and successful. I said this is a good idea because it means more students receive support. However, schools of high need, like ours, have many more students who need tier 2 or 3 services than resources or time to offer this support fully. Our MTSS team has way more referrals than they handle during the times of their meetings, and we definitely don't have enough staff hired to support the specific needs of our students (many of whom has experienced trauma or live in high poverty homes).

Schoolwide expectations of students and staff require a clear vision and focus from the leader, and it also requires accountability. The school leader and teams of support must be ready to have tough questions with staff who aren't seeing through the vision to their standards, and must always adhere to the schoolwide policies themselves. This is easy to say, and hard to do, especially since schools have so many key stakeholders and vested interests that help drive decision-making every day. Additionally, the school leader must make sure that these schoolwide expectations are equitable and that the doors to access and success are open to all students. Again, easier said than done.