There is a growing emphasis in U.S. schools to focus on the social-emotional issues of rural students. Specifically, the effect of mental health issues on school success underscores the importance of collaboration between, and among, educators and specialized support personnel (SSP; e.g., school counselors). In rural areas, school counselors and…

Previous research suggests that the symptoms of oppositional defiant disorder (ODD) reflect both a general diagnostic construct and two distinct symptom dimensions, irritability and defiant behavior. Recent studies have found that these two symptom dimensions exhibit different patterns of correlates and outcomes (e.g., irritability linked to…

Many schools are working toward improving their overall social and behavioral climate. This endeavor is undertaken for its own sake, and in the anticipation that it will improve academic performance for students. There appear to be at least three predominant school-wide approaches to frame improving school climate: (1) positive behavior…

Specialist residential schools have been proposed as a coherent treatment approach for children with severe emotional and behavioural difficulties. This research aimed to explore the perspectives of a range of stakeholders regarding the benefits and disadvantages of attendance at a residential school for children with severe emotional and…

This paper describes the development of the Behavioral and Emotional Strengths Scale (BESS), developed as part of a program which focuses on strengths of children usually seen as having severe emotional and/or behavioral disorders. The BESS is a 68-item scale that identifies children's behavioral strengths on five dimensions: (1) self-control; (2)…

A British residential school for children with emotional and behavioral difficulties set up a class for those children presenting with complex learning needs, including autism, within the school. The special class was observed over a number of weeks and the boys especially benefited tremendously in their social/emotional development and learning.…

This paper discusses the results of a study that investigated the validity and reliability of the Ecology Rating Scale (ERS). The ERS is a brief, multi-dimensional level-of-functioning instrument that can be rated by parents or clinicians. The ERS is comprised of seven domains of youth functioning: family, school, emotional, legal/justice,…