Barnet School Implements Behavioral Program

Details

Created on Wednesday, 04 November 2015 18:47

Written by Tim Laroche

Barnet -- In classrooms at the Barnet Elementary School, good behavior is measured by ping-pong balls

Students who display positive behavior and fulfill so-called "bark expectations" are awarded small plastic balls, which are then dropped into a clear cylindrical tube near the main entrance. When the tube is full, students may earn such incentives as ice cream or an extra recess period.

"I think it helps because it gives some of the people who have trouble behaving something to strive for," Tommy Vaal, a student in the 7th grade at the Barnet School, said.

The "bark expectations" are just some of the many items that Barnet Elementary School has implemented as part of the Positive Behavioral Interventions and Support Program (PBIS), a national behavioral education program designed to help define, develop and evaluate positive behavior and academics in schools across the country.

"I'm very happy with the program," Angel Roy, a guidance counselor at Barnet Elementary School, said. "I think it has made a huge difference in the way our school functions. I think that having everyone on the same page and everyone focusing on positive aspects of the student is wonderful."
Roy, who works closely with students, shares a perspective about the efficacy of the program that many other educators and administrators have similarly expressed.

PBIS was established in 1998 by the United States Department of Education. The program was implemented in various states, and following the initial success of such states as Oregon and Maryland, the Vermont Agency of Education introduced it to Vermont schools in 2007.
Currently, 133 schools in Vermont utilize the PBIS program, and 97% percent of the schools in Vermont that initially adopted the program in 2007 are still using it today.

Barnet Elementary School -- which has proven itself as a model of success in implementing the program -- was awarded an "exemplar status," which is attained when schools successfully implement and run the program for two consecutive years. Barnet is one out of only 20 in the state to reach exemplar status, and only the second to garner special recognition for attaining exemplar status for the fourth consecutive year.

"Over the past 6 years, we have seen our behavioral referrals to the office drop significantly," Barnet School Principal Shawn Gonway said. "The first year I was here we had a little over two-thousand referrals to the office in a year and now we're down to maybe three-hundred."

Eight schools across the state have implemented the PBIS program over the course of the past year, and the Vermont Agency of Education projects that the program will continue to grow based on data that validates the program's effectiveness.

"I think the benefit to implementing PBIS in schools -- at least, shown from the data -- is how students respond to being positively reinforced for following their expectations." Josh Souliere, who is the director for PBIS in Vermont, said.

For more information on which schools have implemented the PBIS program and training programs available, visit pbisvermont.org.

Barnet School Implements Bahvioral Program from NewsLINC on Vimeo.