In this analogue investigation, 215 practicing Pennsylvania school psychologists reviewed hypothetical referral forms and related data (vignettes). Vignettes represented children who met eligibility criteria for special education as well as children who did not. Participants were most likely to recommend, as eligible due to emotional disturbance,…

Rachel Tranter and Nathalie Palin are involved with programmes created in partnership with a range of education providers, particularly Pupil Referral Services in West London. Here they discuss their work at the Orleans House Gallery, providing insights into the scope and potential of the arts and inclusion. In this article they raise issues for…

School counselors are in a unique position to help at-risk students. Research indicates that teaching resiliency skills and emotional intelligence is a promising venture (Bernard, 1997; Chavkin & Gonzalez, 2000; Henderson & Milstein, 2002). Seventy identified at-risk seventh and eighth grade students enrolled in the Teen Leadership Program…

The most salient difficulty in assessing English language learner (ELL) students who exhibit academic difficulties is identifying whether the problem is one of English proficiency or of a learning disability. In many cases, the symptoms are shared and difficult to disentangle, but obtaining a comprehensive picture of the child is vital for…

Cooperative behavior is important for well-functioning high school classrooms in which students trust their teachers and actively engage in academic tasks. Yet, discipline referrals for disruption and defiance are all too common and can result in lost instructional time and increased teacher stress. As such, more needs to be understood about…

There is a growing expectation that schoolteachers should not only act as educators by delivering the national curriculum, but also be more involved as tier one mental health professionals. In this role they are expected to assume some responsibility in the early identification of children's mental health problems and to refer these children for…

The Council for Exceptional Children (CEC) recognizes the impact that Response to Intervention (RTI) can have on the education of all children, roles of special educators, as well as on the special education system. Special educators play an integral role and have a strong and clear identity in the RTI process. As such, this brief presents CEC's…

Short break services in a UK county were studied using a postal survey of 256 families with a child with an autistic spectrum disorder (ASD). Results confirmed high degrees of stress and low levels of informal support for all families, but no significant difference in the informal support available to non-users as compared to users of short break…

Much has been written about the poor representation of culturally diverse students in gifted education, centering on factors such as identification criteria, referral practices, student interests, and parental concerns. Culturally diverse learners--especially those who are gifted--are often left out of programs that may ultimately contribute to…

This article presents how the Valparaiso University Student Counseling and Development Center (SCDC) developed and delivers a combined service treatment model integrating pharmacotherapy with psychotherapy for a subset of the center's clients evidencing significant psychiatric concerns. To explicate the model, several documents that may be of…

Abstract Objective: The authors evaluated the efficacy of the 2002 college-based National Alcohol Screening Day (NASD) by determining: (1) the demographic and clinical characteristics of the participants that were screened and (2) the degree to which those scoring at hazardous drinking levels received clinical intervention or were referred for…

Response to intervention (RTI) arose, in part, from the limited success of the pre-referral process, an approach advocated in the 1980s and 1990s, and accurately measuring the discrepancy between aptitude and achievement in young children. Reflecting these concerns, when the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) was reauthorized in…

New federal legislation requires states to develop policies to refer children younger than age 3 with substantiated cases of abuse or neglect to state Early Intervention (EI) systems. This article presents state-by-state estimates of potential referral and enrollment increases for EI. Many states could experience a significant increase in…

Gatekeeper-training programs, designed to increase identification and referral of suicidal individuals, are widespread but largely untested. A group-based randomized trial with 32 schools examined impact of Question, Persuade, Refer (QPR) training on a stratified random sample of 249 staff with 1-year average follow-up. To test QPR impact, the…

The relationship between referral and special education outcome was investigated in the State of Florida, where students are referred by category (i.e., referred for learning disability services, mental retardation services, etc.). Of specific interest was the congruence between categories for which students were referred and eventual placements.…