Improvement Realized Through Digitized Engineering Business Process

Engineering Division provides services & support to Operations and Projects. Division develops deliverable / report / recommendation for various studies, operation issues related to Engineering, root cause analysis, etc. Division receives an average of five request in a week. Division is handling 175+ studies at a time with support of multiple discipline Engineers within division and are in different stages. The division was handling the complete business process manually with dedicated resources to track the review, approval, execution and progress monitor. It was difficult to track all the steps since the information were scattered with many stakeholders and manual entries are not robust / fool proof. The manual control was insufficient to manage document movement, monitoring engineering activities and progress. This paper highlights the methodology used to digitalize the business process and also the improvement / benefit realized.

Development of Brief Rating Scales for Progress Monitoring Internalizing Behavior

Prevalence estimates suggest that up to 20% of students in schools experience significant internalizing behaviors that impact behavioral, social, or academic functioning. School-based interventions have great potential to promote student mental health; however, validated and feasible brief assessments are needed to progress monitor students’ responses to these supports. The purpose of the current study was twofold: to (a) develop and validate teacher-completed brief rating scales for progress monitoring internalizing concerns in elementary-aged students and (b) determine the reliability of the resultant measures. First, item content was generated and subjected to evaluation by two panels of school-based consumers and researchers. Within the second phase of development, exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses were used to reduce the initial number of items and ensure that the items were indicators of one latent factor. Teachers in grades K–3 ( N = 307) each completed ratings for one randomly selected student in their classroom. Results of factor analysis for each scale indicated one-factor solutions for the 4-item Anxious/Depressed (ω = .88) and 4-item Socially Withdrawn (ω = .87) scales.

A Review of State-Level Procedural Guidance for Implementing Multitiered Systems of Support for Behavior (MTSS-B)

Given the authority of state government over public education, one means of narrowing the best-practice to actual-practice gap in education is by putting forth clear state guidance and recommendations to schools. To date, however, little is known about the national landscape of procedural guidance that is readily available to practitioners looking to implement multitiered systems of support for behavior (MTSS-B). The purpose of the current study was to conduct a systematic review of state department of education websites to understand what guidance is afforded to local education agencies regarding MTSS-B. Results supported that roughly half of the states provided some form of procedural guidance for MTSS-B; however, both the type (e.g., what interventions to use, how often to progress monitor) and level of guidance varied widely. When states did provide behavior-specific guidance, documents were most likely to include specification of what types of interventions and measures to utilize; information less typically focused on assessment such as indications as to how often data should be collected and reviewed or what decision rule(s) should be used to determine student responsiveness. Implications for local implementation and strengthening future state-level guidance for MTSS-B are discussed.

Teaching Middle School Students With Learning Disabilities to Comprehend Text Using Self-Questioning

Middle school students with learning disabilities often struggle to gain meaning from text. Engaging in self-questioning is an effective strategy for comprehending text, however, middle school students with learning disabilities often do not naturally engage in self-questioning before, during, or after reading. These students may also have difficulty generating questions to ask themselves while reading text. This article presents evidence-based methods and specific instructional scaffolds for teaching middle school students with learning disabilities to generate questions on their own before, during, and after reading. A discussion of how to progress monitor students’ acquisition of self-questioning will also be provided.

Reliability of Frequent Retrospective Behavior Ratings for Elementary School Students with EBD

This study is a preliminary examination of the reliability of frequent retrospective teacher behavior ratings. Frequent retrospective behavior ratings are an approach for creating scales that can be used to monitor individual behavioral progress. In this study, the approach is used to progress monitor behavioral individualized education plan goals for 7 students with, or at risk of, emotional and behavioral disorders. Reliability was examined for both quantitative-based and qualitative judgment-based retrospective teacher behavior ratings. Quantitative-based behavior ratings focused primarily on frequency and duration scales, whereas qualitative-based behavior ratings focused on topography and intensity scales. Findings indicated that reliability can be adequately achieved, although there is variability depending on the type of scale. Implications are discussed as they relate to progress monitoring individual behavioral goals and examining responsiveness to intervention.