Average Treatment Effect of School-Wide Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports on School-Level Academic Achievement in Florida

The relationship between school-wide positive behavioral interventions and supports (SWPBIS) and school-level academic achievement has not been established. Most experimental research has found little to no evidence that SWPBIS has a distal effect on school-level achievement. Yet, an underlying assumption of SWPBIS is that improving social behavior and reducing problem behavior increasingly exposes all students to classroom instruction and the opportunity for academic success. Therefore, we examined the average treatment effect of SWPBIS implemented with fidelity on the treated schools by leveraging 10 consecutive years of school-level academic achievement data. All elementary schools in Florida (~2,033 schools), including an average of 235 schools implementing SWPBIS with fidelity each year, were included in this study. We estimated a two-level mixed-effects regression model, with schools nested in districts across time, and modeled the percentage of students at or above grade-level benchmark on the Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test (FCAT) reading and mathematics. Results indicate that schools implementing SWPBIS with fidelity had statistically significantly more students at or above grade-level benchmarks, however the effect sizes were small. The results are discussed within the context of distal effects and the fact that few evidence-based academic interventions have demonstrated larger effects when experimentally evaluated.