Multi-Tiered Systems of Support in Elementary Schools: The Definitive Guide to Effective Implementation and Quality Control

Multi-Tiered Systems of Support in Elementary Schools is the leadership handbook and practitioner’s field guide to implementation of Multi-Tiered Systems of Support (MTSS) in elementary schools, leading to improved student outcomes and school safety. Schools can creatively customise replicable best practices using this in-depth operations manual to guide MTSS teams in planning and delivering tiers of academic and integrated social-emotional and behavioural supports to meet the needs of all students. This text introduces Healthy Minds, Safe Schools, an evidence-based program that significantly improves student well-being, school safety, and teacher feelings of self-efficacy for delivering social-emotional and behavioural curriculum in the classroom.

Featuring team exercises and real perspectives from educators, this text shows how to make incremental yet manageable changes at elementary schools in accordance with public policy mandates and evidence-based practices by developing smart teams and programs, identifying roles and responsibilities, implementing layers of academic support and services, improving social-emotional and behavioural health of students, and creating an inclusive school culture. It details organisational psychology and socially just educational practices and is a handbook aligned with the U.S. Secret Service National Threat Assessment Center guidebook for preventing school violence and with the National Center for School Mental Health Curriculum.

Table of Contents

Introduction;

1. New Foundations for Multi-Tiered Systems of Support
2. Evaluating Your School’s Needs and Building Your Team
3. Invest in Resources at Your School
4. How to Build Your Program
5. How an MTSS Team Works Together
6. It’s the Format, Not the Forms
7. Special Education Eligibility and Other Considerations
8. Early Childhood Recommendations
9. Family Engagement

10. School Safety and Student Well-Being

11. Social-Emotional-Behavioral MTSS

12. Program Evaluation and Feedback Looping

13. Advocacy and Policy Making

14. Trouble Shooting Guide

15. Moving Forward Together

16. Resources and Glossary

"Education must find its way from a soft science filled with belief, unproven ideas and misguided enthusiasm to a scientist practitioner model in which educators develop, test, modify, and implement effective educational strategies to help today’s students maximize their acquisition of knowledge while simultaneously developing their capacities for thinking, reasoning, problem solving, stress hardiness and resilience. Alison Clark and Katherine Dockweiler have created a valuable desk reference and resource for psychologists, educators and allied health professionals working within elementary schools."
- Sam Goldstein, adjunct assistant professor, Department of Psychiatry, University of Utah School of Medicine

"This important guide will be instrumental for administrators, teachers, and other educators in meeting students’ academic and social-emotional and behavioral needs. Program efficacy, as determined by regular program evaluation cycles, is at the heart of MTSS implementation and improvement. The path to building and sustaining effective supports for students’ social-emotional and behavioral health is emphasized in this textbook, resulting in significant and transformative outcomes. Not only are Alison Clark and Katherine Dockweiler way ahead of the curve in proactively addressing school safety through promotion of student well-being and school-based mental health services, but they are pioneers in the field of school psychology in fostering meaningful change in hard-to-change systems."
- Shelly Edwards, veteran school psychologist