Supporting Scale-up of Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports: A National Technical Assistance Model

Abstract

An on-going challenge for any educational initiative is sustained implementation with fidelity. For decades, the U.S. Department of Education has funded Technical Assistance and Dissemination (TA/D) Centers to assist state education agencies (SEA) and local education agencies (LEA) with implementation. To date, TA/D Centers have had limited or unknown impact on implementation of evidence-based practices. This chapter (a) provides a historical overview of the US Department of Education, Office of Special Education Program’s Center on Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports (PBIS), a TA/D Center that has been funded through five 5-year competitive grant cycles and (b) describes the initial and on-going problem-solving framework developed to assist SEAs and LEAs with implementation of PBIS that shaped all Center activities, including recent mission expansions, across the life of the Center. Specifically, the four key challenges that guided the Center’s work are discussed that include (1) developing a widely generalizable set of materials and processes for dissemination; (2) producing a set of practices and processes that allow for various outcome priorities and staff configurations; (3) taking Center TA/D efforts to scale; and (4) to sustain implementation with fidelity. Further consideration for the rationale for creating a set of implementation “blueprints” versus a standard curriculum and progress to date in addressing the noted challenges and expanded implementation efforts are provided.KeywordsTechnical Assistance and Dissemination CentersState education agenciesLocal education agenciesImplementationScale-upPositive Behavioral Interventions and Supports