One of the greatest challenges for any school is creating and maintaining a safe and disciplined school environment.
 

The PBIS system teaches students the important life skills of self-discipline and positive relationships with peers and adults. More immediate however, is that data proves that the PBIS program results in a happier, safer school climate and greater student learning and achievement. We are in our second year of implementing a program known as P.B.I.S. (Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports) here at Kent Island High School.  P.B.I.S is a systems wide approach to increasing positive behavior and reducing the number of discipline related incidents.
 

P.B.I.S. came to Maryland in 1999 and in July of that year the Maryland State Department of Education, in collaboration with the Sheppard Pratt Health System conducted the initial workshops for Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports (PBIS).

So what is PBIS?

P.B.I.S. is a systems approach to create and maintain positive school climates. Preventing school discipline problems is the emphasis with a strong focus on explicit teaching of behavioral expectations. The thought is that students may not possess the skills to know how to transition from one activity to another or how to walk down the hallway appropriately. However, if those skills are taught, modeled and then taught again, the students will understand and willingly follow what you have asked them to do.

The old standard of telling the student once and expecting them to accomplish the task is no longer the norm. Students need to be taught each behavioral expectation that you have for them. For example, our teachers now teach what it looks like to pay attention, how to ask a question, how to wash their hands in the bathroom, how to enter the cafeteria and even how to transition from math to science. PBIS stresses identifying outcomes while sustaining a positive school climate.

During the 2006 school year we had over 1,000 office referrals at Kent Island High School. Many students spent significant time either in the office, in the alternative classroom or out on suspension. In the Spring of 2007, our principal Mrs. Denise Hershberger introduced P.B.I.S. to the Administrative team sharing that PBIS was a proven research based method for reducing problem behavior at a relatively low cost. Principal Denise Hershberger requested that Kent Island High School be given the funding and the training to implement PBIS at Kent island High School. Our staff was trained over the summer of 2007 and when school opened in August we officially started our P.B.I.S. program. The number of office referrals dropped by 70% for first semester school wide and by the end of the school year  2007-2008, we had reduced the number of referrals by 58% school wide. This trend has continued for the 2008-2009 school year and our referrals have been reduced by over 70% for this school year. We were recently award the PBIS Gold Medal Award from the Maryland State Department of Education which is the highest honor a school can receive and we earned this award in just our second year of implementation.

In the past, school-wide discipline has focused mainly on reacting to bad behavior with punishment loss of privileges, office referrals and negativity. Research has shown that the implementation of punishment in the absence of other positive strategies is ineffective. Introducing, modeling and reinforcing positive social behavior is important to a student’s educational experience. Teaching behavioral expectations and rewarding students for following them is a more positive approach than waiting for misbehavior to occur before responding. The purpose of P.B.I.S. at Kent Island High School is to develop and maintain a school climate where positive respectful behavior is the standard.