Policy & Program Reports & Briefs

1. School Improvement and Restructuring Related to Addressing Barriers to Learning & Teaching
   
   
   1. Policy Analyses & Alerts
       
      • Improving Student/Learning Supports Requires Reworking the Operational Infrastructure
        
        
      • We won't Argue Against Adding More Counselors,
        BUT ...
        Addressing Student Mental Health Concerns Involves Much More than Increasing the Number of Mental Health Providers
        
        
      • Enhancing Student/Learning Supports in Classrooms
        
        
      • About Connecting Students with the Right Forms of Mental Health Assistance
        
        
      • Evolving Community Schools and Transforming Student/Learning Supports
        
        
      • New Directions for SchoolImprovement Policy
        
        
      • How Well Do State Legislatures Focus on Improving School Efforts to Address Barriers to Learning and Teaching & Re engage Disconnected Students?
        
        
      • Improving How Schools Address Barriers to Learning & Teaching: Escaping Old Ideas and Moving Beyond Current Trends
        
        
      • Bringing Empirically Supported Prototypes/Practices to Schools
        
        
      • What are States Doing to Help Schools Address Barriers to Learning and Teaching?
        
        
      • ESSA and Addressing Barriers to Learning and Teaching: Is there Movement toward Transforming Student/Learning Supports?
        
        
      • Time for straight talk about mental health services and mental health in schools –
        
        
      • Brief Report on Responses to an Inquiry about Which Schools are Taking Equity Seriously?
        
        
      • Piecemeal Policy Advocacy for Improving Schools Amounts to Tinkering and Works Against Fundamental System Transformation
        
        
      • Preparing for ESSA? Start by Reviewing Analyses of What’s been Wrong with School Improvement Efforts
        
        
      • Using ESSA to EMBED Mental Health into School Improvement
        
        
      • ESSA, Equity of Opportunity, and Addressing Barriers to Learning
        
        
      • Supports for Students Deemed At-Risk
        
        
      • Expanding School Improvement Policy to More Effectively Address Barriers to Learning and Teaching
        
        
      • Being Rational and Analytical in Bringing Evidence-Based Practices into Schools
        
        
      • Rethinking School Evaluation and Accountability to Get Credit for All that is Being Done
        
        
      • ESSA: Will Adding a Nonacademic Accountability Indicator Enhance Student and Learning Supports?
        
        
      • Whole Child Schooling and the 2015 National Initiative for Transforming Student and Learning Supports
        
        
      • Standards Debates Continue to Ignore Student and Learning Supports
        
        
      • Integrated Student Supports and Equity: What’s Not Being Discussed?
        
        
      • Blueprints for Education Reform: Have You Analyzed the Architects’ Vision?
        
        
      • Turning Around, Transforming, and Continuously Improving Schools: Federal Proposals are Still Based on a Two- Rather than a Three- Component Blueprint
        
        
      • Improving Schools? Not Another Special Initiative!
        
        
      • Senate's ESEA Reauthorization Proposal & Equity of Opportunity: Any Concerns?
        
        
      • For Consideration in Reauthorizing the No Child Left Behind Act . . . Promoting a Systematic Focus on Learning Supports to Address Barriers to Learning and Teaching
        
        
      • Legislation in Need of Improvement: Reauthorizing the No Child Left Behind Act to Better Address Barriers to Learning
        
        
      • Synthesis and Analysis of Recommendations to Congress for ESEA Reauthorization from the Perspective of Addressing Barriers to Learning & Teaching
        
        
      • Pursuing Promise Neighborhoods: With or Without the Grant Program
        
        
      • Arguing About Charters VS. "Traditional" Schools Masks the Failure of School Improvement Policy and Practice to Enhance Equity of Opportunity
        
        
      • School Attendance Problems: Are Current Policies & Practices Going in the Right Direction?
        
        
      • Grade Retention: What's the Prevailing Policy and What Needs to be Done?
        
        
      • Policies and Practices for Addressing Barriers to Learning: Current Status and New Directions
        
        
      • Preschool Programs: A Synthesis of Current Policy Issues
        
        
      • About Short-term Outcome Indicators for School Use and the Need for an Expanded Policy Framework
        
        
   2. Addressing Barriers to Learning & Teaching
      
      
      • Enhancing Home Involvement to Address Barriers to Learning: A Collaborative Process
        
        
      • “Not Another Team!” School Improvement Infrastructure Viewed through the Lens of Addressing Barriers to Learning and Teaching
        
        
      • Designing School Improvement to Enhance Classroom Climate for All Students
        
        
      • Understanding Community Schools as Collaboratives for System Building to Address Barriers and Promote Well-Being
        
        
      • Addressing Barriers to Student Learning: Closing Gaps in School/Community Policy and Practice
        
        
      • Another Initiative? Where Does it Fit? A Unifying Framework and an Integrated Infrastructure for Schools to Address Barriers to Learning and Promote Healthy Development
        
        
      • Designing Schoolwide Programs in Title I Schools: Using the Non-Regulatory Guidance in Ways that Address Barriers to Learning and Teaching
        
        
      • Schools as Caring, Learning Communities
        
        
      • Early Development and School Readiness from the Perspective of Addressing Barriers to Learning
        
        
      • Addressing Barriers to Student Learning & Promoting Healthy Development: A Usable Research-Base
        
        
   3. Rethinking Student and Learning Supports for School Improvement
       
      • 2021-22: Addressing Learning, Behavior, and Emotional Problems Through Better Use of Student and Learning Support Staff
        
        
      • Don’t Water-down a System of Student and Learning Supports
        
        
      • Introduction to a component for Addressing Barriers to Student Learning
        
        
      • Addressing What's Missing in School Improvement Planning: Expanding Standards and Accountability to Encompass an Enabling or Learning Supports Component
        
        
      • School Improvement Planning: What's Missing?
        
        
      • Expanding Educational Reform to Address Barriers to Learning: Restructuring Student Support Services and Enhancing School-Community Partnerships
        
        
      • Example of a Formal Proposal for Moving in New Directions for Student Support
        
        
      • Learning Supports and Small Schools
        
        
      • Rethinking District Budgets to Unify and Sustain a Critical Mass of Student and Learning Supports at Schools
        
        
      • Viable School Improvement Requires a Developmental Strategy that Moves Beyond the Skewed Wish List and Reworks Operational infrastructure
        
        
      • School Improvement: A Functional View of Enabling Equity of Opportunity
        
        
      • Embedding Bullying Interventions into a Comprehensive System of Student and Learning Supports
        
        
      • Implementing Response to Intervention in Context
        
        
   4. Leadership Matters
       
      • What Every Leader for School Improvement Needs to Know About Student and Learning Supports
        
        
      • What Do Principals Say about Their Work? Implications for Addressing Barriers to Learning and School Improvement
        
        
      • District Superintendents and the School Improvement Problem of Addressing Barriers to Learning
        
        
      • Implementation Science and Innovative Transformation of Schools and Communities
        
        
      • State Education Agencies & Learning Supports: Enhancing School Improvement
        
        
      • Transforming Schools or Tinkering? An Analysis of CCSSO's Model Core Teaching Standards
         
   5. Specific Practice Concerns
       
      • Whole Person, Whole School
        
        
      • Dropout Prevention: Do Districts Pursue Best Practice Recommendations?
        
        
      • Youth Gangs and Schools
        
        
      • A Look at Gaming Culture and Gaming Related Problems: From a Gamer’s Perspective
      • Interventions to Support Readiness, Recruitment, Access, Transition, and Retention for Postsecondary Education Success: An Equity of Opportunity Policy and Practice Analysis
        
        
   6. Concept Papers and Proposals for Restructuring
      (see also Books, Chapters, and Articles and Other Center Resources)
      
      
      • Bringing New Prototypes into Practice: Dissemination, Implementation, and Facilitating Transformation
        
        
      • Moving Beyond the Three Tier Intervention Pyramid Toward a Comprehensive Framework for Student and Learning Supports
        
        
      • Assuring No Child is Left Behind
        
        
      • Framing New Directions for School Counselors, Psychologists, & Social Workers
        
        
      • Guidelines for a Student Support Component
        • Full Document
          
        • Summary Outline
           
      • New Directions for Student Support (Concept Paper)
        
        
      • Q & A Talking Points
        
        
      • Key Leadership Mechanisms for Enhancing Student & Learning Supports
        
        
      • Restructuring Boards of Education to Enhance Schools' Effectiveness in Addressing Barriers to Student Learning
        • Full Report
        • Executive Summary
           
      • So you Want Higher Achievement Scores? It's Time to Rethink Learning Supports
        
        
      • Two Examples of White Papers to Inform and Guide Policy Makers
        
        
      • What is a Comprehensive Approach to Student Supports?
        
        
      • Where's It Happening? New Directions for Student Support
        
        
      • What Might a Fully Functioning Enabling or Learning Supports Component Look Like at a School?
         
   7. Calls to Action to Advance Efforts to Address Barriers to Student Learning:
       
      • An Open Letter to Congress: Reauthorizing the Elementary and Secondary Education Act to Better Address Barriers to Learning and Teaching
        
        
      • An Open letter To Mayors: discussion of a mayor's role in public education
        
        
      • School Improvement? . . . fully addressing barriers to learning and teaching is the next step!
        
        
      • Student Support Staff: Moving in New Directions through School Improvement
        
        
   8. Systemic Change and Sustainability
       
      • Implementation Science and Complex School Changes
        
        
      • Improving Teacher Retention, Performance, and Student Outcomes
        
        
      • Connecting Schools in Ways that Strengthen Learning Supports
        
        
      • School Policy Alert - Improving Outcomes for Students and Schools Requires a Comprehensive System of Learning Supports
        
        
      • Toolkit - Rebuilding Student Supports into a Comprehensive System for Addressing Barriers to Learning and Teaching
        
        
      • Community Schools: Working Toward Institutional Transformation
        
        
      • Moving Toward a Comprehensive System of Learning Supports: The Next Evolutionary Stage in School Improvement Policy and Practice
        
        
      • New Directions for Student Support: Current State of the Art
        
        
      • New Initiatives: Considerations Related to Planning, Implementing, Sustaining, and Going- to-Scale
        
        
      • Organization Facilitators: A Key Change Agent for Systemic School and Community Changes
        
        
      • Preparing All Education Personnel to Address Barriers to Learning & Teaching
        
        
      • Systemic Change for School Improvement: Designing, Implementing, and Sustaining Prototypes and Going to Scale
        • Full Report
        • Executive Summary
           
      • Toward Enhancing Resource Center Collaboration
        
        
      • Toward a School District Infrastructure that More Effectively Addresses Barriers to Learning and Teaching
        
        
      • Transforming School Improvement to Develop a Comprehensive System of Learning Supports: What District Superintendents Say They Need to Move Forward
        
        
2. Mental Health in Schools Analyses
   
   
   1. A look at some federal/state initiatives
      
      
      • Policy Analysis - A Concerned Analysis of Arizona’s ESSA Draft Plan for Supporting All Students
        
        
      • Policy Brief - ESSA, Equity of Opportunity, and Addressing Barriers to Learning
        
        
      • Policy Alert - School Improvement Implications of the President’s Plan for Making Schools Safer and Increasing Access to Mental Health
        
        
      • Policy Alert - Don’t Just React: It’s Time to Rethink Policy for Mental Health in Schools
        
        
      • Building Collaboration for Mental Health Services in California Schools: What Will be Built?
        
        
      • Prevention and Early Intervention in California s Mental Health Services Act: A Summary of School-Based Programs in Ten County Plans
        
        
      • Integrating Agenda for Mental Health in Schools into the Recommendations of the President's New Freedom Commission on Mental Health
        
        
      • Gap Analysis of the Resource Synthesis Related to integrating Mental Health in Schools into the Recommendations of the President's New Freedom Commission on Mental Health
        
        
      • Integration of Schools and Mental Health Systems: An Overview of the State Grants from the U.S. Department of Education Program
        
        
      • The Maternal and Child Health Bureau's Initiative for Mental Health in Schools
         
   2. State of the Field
      
      
      • Policy Alert - Embedding Mental Health into a Learning Supports Component: An Essential Step for the Field to Take Now
        
        
      • The Current Status of Mental Health in Schools: A Policy and Practice Analysis
        
        
      • Mental Health in Schools: Reflections on the Past, Present, and Future
        
        
      • Youngsters' Mental Health and Psychosocial Problems: What are the Data?
        
        
      • Should Policy Specify a Formal Role for Schools Related to Mental Health?
        
        
      • Integrating Mental Health in Schools: Schools, School-Based Centers, and Community Programs Working Together
        
        
      • Mental Health of Children and Youth: The Important Role of Primary Care Health Professionals
        
        
      • Mental Health of Children and Youth and the Role of Public Health Professionals
        
        
      • Financing Mental Health for Children & Adolescents
        
        
   3. Analyses of Pratice
      
      
      • Youth Risk Taking Behavior: The Role of Schools
        
        
      • Youth Substance Use Interventions: Where Do they Fit into a School's Mission?
        
        
      • Immigrant Children and Youth: Enabling Their Success at School
        
        
      • Beyond Placement in the Least Restrictive Environment: The Concept of Least Intervention Needed and the Need for a Continuum of Community-School Programs
        
        
      • Diversity Competence for Psychological Practitioners: Eliminating Disparities in Psychological Practices
        
        
      • Screening Mental Health Problems in Schools
        
        
      • Suicide Prevention in Schools
        
        

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      WebMaster: Perry Nelson (smhp@ucla.edu)