Date of Award
2004
Document Type
Dissertation
Degree Name
Doctor of Education
Department
Fischler Graduate School of Education and Human Services
Advisor
Harvey Sadoff
Committee Member
Dennis Triplett
Committee Member
Maryellen Maher
Keywords
Brent Elementary, Brent Elementary School, classroom management, class meetings, community expectations, discipline, discipline referrals, elementary school, evaluation methods, intervention strategy, noncertified employees, positive intervention, positive schoolwide discipline plan, preventive measures, principal, punitive measures, rural schools, sixth grade, stakeholder values, student behavior, teacher data, teachers, year-to-year comparison
Abstract
Brent Elementary is a small, rural, 4th- through 6th-grade school with 474 students. The staff includes the principal, 25 certified employees, and 12 noncertified employees. High values and expectations of stakeholders exist throughout the school and community. Students’ behavior is that of regular students of this age group and discipline problems are not severe or major. However, the Brent Elementary School administrators were concerned about the number of discipline referrals received during a school year. In 2000-2001, 1,211 (46%) discipline referrals were issued to 6th graders, which reflected a 9.3% decrease from 1999-2000.
The intervention strategy developed and implemented was a different approach to discipline. The designed approach utilized a positive schoolwide discipline plan with the focus on preventive rather than punitive measures. It included improvements for students’ behavior and classroom management methods. The method of evaluation compared 3 years of discipline referrals and data collected from teachers.