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MCLAUGHLIN MIDDLE

DEMOGRAPHIC INFORMATION:

1. School District: Polk

2. Grade Levels: 6, 7, 8

3. Student Enrollment: 818

4. Percent of ESOL Students: 3.4%

5. Free and Reduced Lunch Percent: 68.4%

6. Percent of Students With IEP's: 9.9%

School Website

TEAMING:

What makes your team work so well? Please discuss in detail (e.g., what is your administrator’s role on the team, how is staff represented, etc.)? McLaughlin has a very diverse staff. Our team represents the diversity among the staff very well. We have members from each grade level, from Electives/Fine Arts, from Guidance, from ESE, as well as our Dean of Discipline and our assistant principal for Discipline. Our principal Mrs. Kurschner is very supportive of PBS. She receives a copy of the minutes of our meetings and has offered input when she feels it is needed. Our team works well together because we have a common vision. Every person on our team has a love for the students and faculty of McLaughlin Middle School and Fine Arts Academy. With this comes an intense desire to see our school achieve success both academically and behaviorally.

How does your team use data to make decisions on campus? We meet as a team at least twice a month. One of those meetings is dedicated in its entirety to reviewing the data and brainstorming ways we can see decreases in discipline problems and increases in positive behaviors.

How do you share information with the rest of your faculty (e.g., emails, newsletters, meetings, etc.)? How often do you share this information? We share information with our staff through e-mails and through announcements at faculty meetings at least once a month. The PBS team has a good rapport with the staff. They know they can come to us with any questions or comments.

What do you see as the overall strengths of your team? Please provide details. Our team’s dedication to this school is unparalleled. When we meet as a team our time is productive because we keep our focus on improving our school through Positive Behavior Support. Our team is creative and grounded at the same time. We feel that these qualities are what make us successful.

IMPLEMENTATION:

The McLaughlin Middle School and Fine Arts Academy PBS team excels in several different areas when it comes to the implementation of the PBS model. The first area is in rewarding students. The team has devised several strategies for rewarding students. Students have the opportunity to win individual rewards such as gift cards, passes, and other rewards. The students also have long term rewards such as PBS movie days, and PBS parties. The second area of implementation that McLaughlin Middle School and Fine Arts Academy excels in is teaching expectations. At the beginning of the school year, the staff was told to teach the expectations to the students in any manner they deemed necessary, and each grade level submitted lesson plans for teaching the expectations. The creative arts staff of the school is also developing a movie in order to teach the expectations through a dramatic production. The data-decision making implementation has also been implemented very precisely. Once per month, the team meets to discuss data, and to implement ideas to address the areas that are data-related. The data is reviewed individually as well as by the entire team prior the meeting

OUTCOMES:

Since the implementation of PBS our school’s overall discipline has improved remarkably, and the overall atmosphere at the school is one of positivity and enjoyment. The data alone speaks volume of how successful our implementation has been, but seeing the morale change in not only our staff but our students is just as evident as the data. The climate at McLaughlin has changed in the school and in the community to the point that not as many parents are feeling apprehensive about sending their child or children to McLaughlin with concerns of safety. We are continuing to work on gaining support throughout the community and looking to have local businesses help sponsor our rewards that are given out to the students and staff members throughout the school year. Below are examples of the data for our school through March in comparison to the previous two school years. As they show we are significantly down in all areas and the trends have not wavered throughout the year.

OBSTACLES:

Faculty members who were unwilling to do the tracking chart.
Untrai ned new teachers
Old teachers who needed to be retrained
Lack of funds to do the rewards and to keep them going
teachers who are worked to the overload and still need to do the work involved with keeping PBS Going.

ARTIFACTS:

Be Prepared Lesson Plan (PDF)

Be Respectful (PDF)

Be Responsible (PDF)

Be Safe lesson plans (PDF)

McLaughlin Middle School PBS Implementation 08-09 (PDF)

Office Managed (PDF)

Staff PowerPoint (PDF)

Teacher Managed (PDF)