Our team consists of representation from all grade levels, Related Arts teachers and our Safe School Aide. The majority of members have been on the team for 2 years which has helped us to establish continuity with establishing our school wide action plan. Administration is very active on the team and is always represented at our monthly meetings.  Our PBS Team responds to the supportive environment developed by the TBE Leadership Team.  Just as the students are expected to follow the 3 R’s, so do the PBS Team members. In addition, Team members share mutual respect for each other, are highly organized and are dedicated to the teaching profession.  Overall PBS goals are tied to our School Improvement Plan which has been highly successful for the past 6 years. Our team collaborates on all decisions.   Each grade level representative obtains input from their grade levels; teacher assistants give feedback on cafeteria and recess procedures, as well as arrival and dismissal procedures.  Administration shares SWIS data, the team analyzes and critiques problem areas, and devises solutions to these problem areas.  These ideas are disseminated with the entire staff at the following: Steering Committee, faculty and monthly team meetings, IEP meetings, ELL meetings, parent conferences initiated through our CAST Committee, PTO and SAC meetings.  In addition, data has been shared with parents of specific students to reinforce teacher and staff decisions regarding chronic behavior issues such as tardiness, bus and classroom referrals and other major offenses. 

All PBS data and information is shared with the rest of our Tommie Barfield staff at monthly Steering Committee meetings, Faculty meetings, Early Release Days, PTO and SAC meetings.  Our daily Morning Line (via email) provides us with updates on school events, motivational ideas, suggestions on positive discipline and incentives being given to selected individuals, classrooms or staff members.  Teachers can access and/or submit additional PBS information from Edushare.

Our school’s WTBE Morning News reinforces the PBS expectations.  Announcements are made recognizing individuals, classrooms and buses who have demonstrated positive exemplary behavior.  Modeling of the Character Education Traits has been reinforced with the assemblies that the students attended throughout the year.  For example, our Morning Musicians had performed the following musical productions, “Choices Count” and “From the Inside Out” to the entire school and parents.  

Our team has focused on these three areas of implementation: 
Teaching the expectations –

• Posters of the school-wide expectations are displayed around the entire campus
• WTBE Morning News announces important PBS news;
•  School wide expectations are aligned to the Character Education traits
• Created school pledge that is recited every morning on the WTBE News
• Created the PBS brochure for parents
• Staff and students continually demonstrate the quiet sign (peace sign) as a non-verbal cue to model the school-wide expectations
• Lesson plans had been created for the primary and intermediate grades to assist teachers with the modeling of the 3R’s
• Student planners contained a supplemental section addressing conflict resolution and bully prevention strategies
• Instructional Resource class teacher, a certified school counselor, worked with grade levels on friendship skills, appropriately expressing feelings, and problem solving

Rewarding Students-

• Classrooms use the Manatee Program to reward their class for appropriate behavior on the school campus. 
• The Manatee Program allows other staff members to compliment classrooms that demonstrated the 3R’s. 
• Extra recess and popcorn parties are awarded to classes who complete their Manatee puzzle or demonstrate excellent cafeteria behavior every 2 weeks. 
• Individual students are recognized for the following awards: 
• Citizen of the Month
• Student of the Week
• WOW Awards for exemplifying outstanding 3 R behaviors
• 5th graders are honored by Rotary Club monthly
• PBS pencils have been made to give to students as incentives for displaying the 3R’s
• incentive cards are given to 3-5th graders for their grade point average each quarterly report card
• Positive Attitude Awards are given to students who are demonstrating positive academic, social or emotional competencies
• Bonus Bucks can be given to students for being responsible helpers to staff members   
• Safety Patrol Awards are given to those students who model WOW behaviors 
• First Friend Coupon Books are given to new students who have joined the TBE family to welcome them and help them adjust to their new school environment 
• Local businesses in the community recently gave TBE certificates for free meals to award to students who demonstrate the 3R’s  

Data based decision-making-  
Data is analyzed and shared frequently with the PBS Committee, faculty and parents.  The outcomes of the data assist the Committee with making decisions concerning scheduling as well as dealing with frequent offenders. 

• Our lunch and recess procedures were changed this year after analyzing the data from the previous year.  
• A new cafeteria behavior system was implemented which reduced the number of referrals from both recess and lunch behaviors.
• Students who were frequent offenders with numerous referrals were given mentors from the school’s Leadership Team.  The mentors met with the students on a weekly basis and discussed problems that they were experiencing.
• Behavior plans were created for students who exhibited improper

behavior.  The behavior plan was used for all academic areas, recess, and bus transportation 

• Students were given positive reinforcement when they demonstrated the 3 R’s and had met the goals of their individual behavior plan.

These are the changes that were noticed since the second year of implementation of PBS:

• Staff was energized due to overall positive behavior improvement based on the data comparing the significant decrease in the number of referrals this academic school year. There were 354 referrals in May of 2007, and 182 in May of 2008. 
• Switched recess to before lunch due to the number of problems at recess.

• Lunch recess problems had decreased. A positive effect occurred with having the students attend recess prior to lunch.  The referrals occurring around noontime decreased from 104 to 64 indicating that this change had a significant positive effect on student behavior.
• Students at the top 5 percent of referrals were mentored and/or class adjustments were made.
• Increased positive recognition for students
• Knowledge of everyone concerning expectations – “Common Language” - 3 R’s across entire campus
• Increased the number of appropriate student behaviors in classrooms, recess, buses and cafeteria:
• Teachers handled minor infractions within their classrooms. In 2006-2007 school year, the majority of the referrals were coming from the classroom (162) and in 2007-2008, there were only 88.  That is almost a 50% drop in the number of referrals from the classroom 
• The daily reciting of our new school pledge had helped students to be cognizant of what it means to be a Respectful, Responsible, Role model at TBE
• The committee feels that this was due to the common language and consistent expectations being implemented by staff members in all classrooms.
• All locations in the school indicate a drop in the number of referrals from the previous year.
• Music teacher has produced programs with her Morning Musicians group that focused on Character Education Traits and positive behavior.
• Related Arts Team,and other staff members have recognized a happier, warmer and gentler climate at the school.

These are the obstacles our team has had to overcome:

• Change
• Our staff strives to work on “change” by recognizing that our PBS implementation has benefited our school 
• The positive recognition of students, fewer behavior issues, knowledge of the PBS expectations and overall climate of the school has helped the staff accept the PBS philosophy
• Staff buy-in 
• Each grade level, related arts and non-instructional staff has representation on the committee
•  The 2007/08 school year began with a faculty meeting dedicated to PBS. The content of the meeting was analyzing SWIS data and playing a PBS Jeopardy Game
• SWIS data as well as highlights from monthly PBS Committee meetings was shared during Steering Committee meetings (once a month).
• October Early Release Day was set aside to review SWIS data and develop lesson plans reviewing all our school wide rules and expectations
• PBS committee disseminates information about other PBS schools and the strategies they had successfully implemented
• Classroom incentive systems have been changed to be more positive for students
• Teacher morale has improved- teachers feel more positive about the school climate; there are fewer behavior issues; teachers are handling minor infractions

• Classroom management is still a challenge with some teachers who need to adopt consistent behavior guidelines that implement daily routines and procedures in their classroom. 
• A staff PBS survey will be developed and distributed at the beginning of 2008-09 school year.  The results of the survey will assist in staff training needs and their opinions concerning implementations this school year and ideas next year.