<p>While many educators viewed transition as a one-time event, it often proved to be more of a process than simply an occasion (Cohen &amp; Smerdon, 2009). The researcher observed through the role as a school counselor that students with high anxiety tended to exhibit low resilience during times of transition. In order to assist students as they moved from eighth to ninth grade, the school of study implemented the Overcoming Obstacles Life Skills Program (OOLSP) using student mentors. This study explored student perception of anxiety and resilience in relation to participating in this program. The researcher utilized the Connor-Davidson Resilience Scale (CD-RISC) and Spence Children&rsquo;s Anxiety Scale (SCAS) as pre- and post-tests, and conducted a <i>z</i>-test for difference in means analysis. Attendance rates were studied, due to the high correlation found in research between attendance and achievement, using a Pearson Product Moment Correlation analysis. Perception questionnaires were completed in December and May by 287 freshmen, 45 mentor students, 16 teachers, and 315 parents. Interviews were conducted with 10 freshmen, nine student mentors, and six teachers. </p><p> Results from the surveys and perception questionnaires proved inconsistent. The SCAS scores indicated a significant change in student anxiety levels, especially on the generalized anxiety disorder, obsessive-compulsive disorder, and panic disorder subscales. Interestingly, students&rsquo; perceived anxiety decreased based on questionnaire responses. Results from the CD-RISC suggested students&rsquo; resilience did not change, while responses from the questionnaire showed a significant increase in students&rsquo; perceived resilience. Attendance rates had a moderately strong relationship, indicating a correlation between eighth and ninth grade attendance. Perceptions from freshmen, student mentors, teachers, and parents suggested that the relationships formed during the program implementation had more influence than the program itself. </p><p> Based on the inconsistent results, the researcher recommended discontinuing the use of the OOLSP, as it was implemented in this study. The researcher recommended maintaining the mentoring program and improving upon pre-existing structures. Future researchers were encouraged to conduct further exploration on the OOLSP using more traditional implementations, as well as investigating student-perceived anxiety and resilience in comparison to documented experiences of anxiety and resilience. </p>

<p> The purpose of this study was to analyze School-Wide Positive Behavior Support (SW-PBS) and Behavior Intervention Support Teams (BIST) and their impact on managing student behavior in sample schools in Missouri by using methodological triangulation. Office disciplinary referrals (ODRs) and Safe School Act Violations during the 2012&ndash;2014 school years in the SW-PBS, BIST, and No Model (control group) sample schools were analyzed to determine if there was a significant difference in the numbers of ODRs and Safe School Violations. Teachers from the sample schools were given the opportunity to participate in a survey to gather their perspectives about the impact their school&rsquo;s respective behavior model had on student behavior outcomes. Teachers surveyed reported varied opinions regarding disciplinary models and the benefits these models have on student self-control and helping to reduce student discipline behaviors. While all perceived their models to have a positive impact, there were differences in overall perceptions. Teachers in SW-PBS schools responded more positively about how the SW-PBS model impacted student behaviors. The ODR data were analyzed using a paired t-test, showing no significant difference between the number of ODRs in the models studied. Safe School Act Violations occurred more frequently in schools that had no behavior models than in schools that had implemented BIST or SW-PBS. The BIST schools had the fewest reported incidents.</p>

To be able to connect the school counseling program to standards-based reform, school counseling initiatives such as The Education Trust's Transforming the School Counseling Initiative and The American School Counseling Association (ASCA) have called for a paradigm shift in the understanding of the school counselor's role, from a service provider to a key player in the success of all students. Consequently, emphasis on advocacy, leadership, teamwork and collaboration, accountability, use of data and systemic change infuses the school counseling literature. As a result of these efforts, a new understanding of school counseling has emerged and leadership is considered to be at the core of the other essential roles of the counselors. Even though school counselors' leadership is a hot topic, studies that holistically examine the leadership practice of school counselors are absent from the school counseling literature. The goal of this paper is to investigate how school counselors play a part in the overall school leadership practice for system-wide improvement. The distributed leadership framework was chosen as an analytical framework to analyze the leadership practices of the school counselors. This paper offers the idea that distributed leadership is a useful tool to understand school counselors' effort on school improvement holistically because this framework calls the unit of analysis not with individual leaders, but their interactions. Briefly, in this study leadership practice is the core unit of analysis in trying to understand school leadership from a distributed perspective. The qualitative research methodology chosen for this study is ethnography and this ethnographic study conducted in Mid West in a high school setting. The data were analyzed with the line-by-line coding technique. The findings indicated that the school counselors at the research site made important systemic changes. These changes mostly happened as a result of the counselors' personal willingness to be part of the leadership in the school. However, the institutionalized opportunities for counselors to lead were limited therefore many changes stayed at the idiosyncratic level and the counselors often relied on their informal working relationships to shape the leadership practice. This paper concluded that a school counselor needs to work in an integrated situation with distributed leadership to be able to create system-wide change and there is a need to ensure institutionalization of school counselor leader roles. The findings of this dissertation study provide some implications for the school principals, school counselors in practice, and those who educate and train school counselors. Principals can provide some opportunities for counselors to engage in formally-constituted multidisciplinary leadership teams. School counselors can think about the ways of being an active participant in school leadership and can learn more about the nature of organizational change. In addition to that they need to raise other school members' awareness about the counselors' appropriate functions and to seriously consider the other school members' perceptions. Graduate programs need to teach students the concept of leadership and organizational change.

Syftet med detta examensarbete är att undersöka hur skolkuratorer kan kategorisera och beskriva de insatser som kan erbjudas till grundskoleelever med neuropsykiatriska funktionsvariationer. Det finns flera lagstiftningar som pekar på barns rättigheter till skolgång samt att alla barn har rätt till anpassningar utifrån deras individuella behov för att forma deras vardag och göra den likvärdig andra barns skolgång. Tidigare forskning indikerar att det finns flera olika typer av insatser till barn med neuropsykiatriska funktionsvariationer som används världen över. De olika typerna av insatser kategoriserar på olika sätt, antingen utifrån diagnos eller problemområde så som akademiska eller beteende-insatser.    För att besvara våra frågeställningar har fyra semistrukturerade intervjuer genomförts med skolkuratorer som arbetar på grundskolor runtom i Sverige. Insamlad data har analyserats utifrån tematisk analysmetod för att förstå hur informanterna kategoriserar de aktuella insatserna. Vidare har data också analyserats utifrån stigmateorin, framställd av Goffman (1963), och stämplingsteorin, framställd av Goldberg (1980), för att skapa förståelse för hur insatserna kan beskrivas och tolkas ur såväl ett samhällsperspektiv som individperspektiv.    Slutsatserna i denna studie visar på att informanterna kategoriserade insatserna utifrån främst två kategorier: individuella insatser och generella insatser. Informanterna valde att försöka anpassa insatserna utifrån de specifika svårigheter som följde diagnoserna så som koncentrationssvårigheter eller anpassningar kring det mänskliga mötet, i stället för att anpassa insatserna utifrån de specifika diagnoserna. Olika typer av insatser manade till en inkluderande miljö och normalisering av extra anpassningar, medan vissa insatser exkluderade och särskilde elever från den gemensamma klassrumsmiljön. Ytterligare slutsatser är att insatserna kan påverka klassrumsmiljön, samt att informanterna i studien genom sitt arbete försökte normalisera behovet av extra anpassningar och därmed motverka stigmatiseringen av neuropsykiatriska funktionsvariationer.

The thesis deals with the profession of school psychologist. We are wondering if there are any reasons that prevent or encourage the introduction of psychologists into schools. The first part of the thesis deals with the concepts of school psychology and school psychologist from the present and historical point of view. We are dedicated to the legislative anchoring of this profession and its ethical standards. We uncover the complex network of the school psychologist, including aspects that can be partaking of teachers' expectations of school psychologists. The second part of the thesis deals with the questionnaire survey which was carried out at the school, where the institution of the school psychologist is already established and where it is not. The data analysis was conducted the analysis. Through her, we found five areas of interest which affect expectations. The first area concerns the role of the school psychologist. The second area concerns of his work. The third is the idea of teachers about the " ideal " school psychologist. The fourth deals with the concerns of teachers and the fifth area concerns the financing of school psychologists. The main findings introduce together with the direct quote. In another part of the main findings offer a comparison between schools, which complement the...

The purpose of this thesis was to identify the most common causes of school suspension within a regional survey in comparison with the views of parents, elementary and kindergarten teachers. In connection with this theme the author dealt with pre-school child characteristics focusing on school maturity diagnosis and school suspension problematics. The main reasearch was realised i Pedagogical-psychological advice centre in Kladno in 3 selected years ranging from 1999 to 2010. The method of analysis has been used to collect the data. A survey in a form of an anonymous questionnaire clearified opinions of selected respondents. On the basis of this observation a casuistry of a school suspended child with specific needs has been made. This casuistry demonstrates further development of a child after starting it's school attendence. Submitted results of the thesis confirmed the opinions of experts in this field as well as conclusions of researches focusing on school suspension issues. It has been found out, that the most common causes of school suspension in the examined lokality are the issues of speech, visual and hearing perception, graphmotorics and school work maturity. This finding was identical with the views of respondents of the survey. The respondents marked psychological area of school...