Implementation science has grown considerably in school mental health over the past decade, driven by the persistent gaps between knowledge about "what works" to promote student well-being and what is typically delivered in schools. In 2014, Owens and colleagues outlined an implementation research agenda for the field of school mental…

Social, emotional, and behavioral interventions are often complicated to implement in school settings. Empirical and practical evidence suggests that educators need support to implement interventions with treatment integrity or as intended. Treatment integrity is comprised of multiple dimensions that capture quantity of the intervention delivered,…

Improving child behavior and promoting family well-being is a key objective of evidence-based parenting programs, such as the Triple P-Positive Parenting Program. To achieve this goal, parenting programs are delivered using a multidisciplinary workforce. Previous researchers have collectively examined the entire workforce of parenting…

Schools are ideal locations for youth to receive mental health and social-emotional programming. Despite the well-established need for school-based mental health programs, many schools do not offer these programs, and those that do often face implementation challenges that hinder the effectiveness of the programs. Peer-led programs may be an…

Notwithstanding the multiple descriptions and principles associated with trauma-informed schools (TIS), the field lacks a well-defined operational definition of TIS. This scoping review aimed to characterize TIS intervention components and implementation strategies described in published studies of TIS. This review also examined the extent to…

The impact of trauma on the development and educational performance of school children and the benefits of trauma-informed practices have become more evident to both scientists and educators. Creating an effective and sustainable trauma-informed approach in schools, however, proves to be a challenging, time-consuming and complex process. This…

Although social and emotional learning (SEL) benefits children and youth worldwide, classifying a program as SEL is insufficient to capture its variability of content. There is currently little to aid in identifying specific program content so that foci may be identified (e.g., self-management skills vs. social skills). This gap poses a difficulty…

Public schools are a major provider of mental health services for children in the US. Mental and behavioral health services range from universal programming to individualized clinical supports to address student needs. These services in schools are delivered by various professionals including non-teaching and teaching school personnel,…

The purpose of this special series is to highlight how the measurement of integrity, both treatment integrity and integrity for implementation strategies, can support intervention development, evaluation, and implementation research. The seven papers and one commentary in this special series illustrate how diverse measurement approaches are used…

Schools have become primary providers of mental health services for children and adolescents (Kern et al. in School Mental Health 9:205-217, 2017). Within schools, school principals play a significant role in the implementation of school-based mental health (SBMH; Langley et al. in School Mental Health 2:105-113, 2010). This multimethod study…

Social-emotional learning (SEL), character education, and positive behavior intervention and supports (PBIS) are common approaches to Tier 1 universal social, emotional, and behavioral (SEB) supports in schools. There has been emerging evidence supporting the superior effect of integrated prevention that combines approaches to Tier 1 universal SEB…

Principals' efforts to support the implementation of interventions involve coordination among multiple actors in their social networks. However, less is known about how distinct features of these social networks are associated with principals' perceptions of the social validity of interventions. In this paper, we used Neal and Neal (Implement Sci…

Numerous evidence-based programs (EBPs) exist for delivery in schools to promote youth mental health outcomes. However, school systems often lack the internal infrastructure to support the effective implementation and sustainment of EBPs when external supports are withdrawn, resulting in notable attenuation in the benefits in youth clinical…

The rising prevalence of mental health challenges among youth has created a pressing need for effective, feasible, equitable, and contextually relevant interventions. Educators and school mental health professionals face critical challenges in helping students overcome such barriers to school success. This makes the need for school-based…

Children in rural settings are less likely to receive mental health services than their urban and suburban counterparts and even less likely to receive evidence-based care. Rural schools could address the need for mental health interventions by using evidence-based practices within a tiered system of supports such as positive behavioral…