University of Minnesota and Minneapolis Public Schools

Introduction

There are three main components in the Check & Connect Project.

An individual, referred to as a Check & Connect monitor, who works with students and families over an extended period of time, at least two years.
The monitor regularly checks on the educational progress of the student.
The monitor intervenes, or connects, in a timely manner to re-establish and maintain students' connection to school and learning.

Check & Connect is a model designed to promote student's engagement with school and to prevent youth from dropping out. Research on resiliency among children and adults has sought to explain survival and success in the face of adversity. From the resiliency perspective, life outcomes are the result of the interaction between risk factors and protective forces in a young person's life. Personal and financial limitations such as learning challenges, poverty, siblings or parents who have had negative school experiences are among the risk factors which many high school students with emotional and behavioral problems face. These challenges are compounded by the stress of making the transition into a high school environment, which typically expects students to accept responsibility for adjusting to new rules and behavioral expectations on their own. Because high schools are structured in a way that tends to be less responsive to individual and family needs than the elementary system, often the emotional and behavioral disability can become more of a handicap in this new context.

Resiliency research suggests that one of the most important factors for student success is the presence of an adult in a student's life to fuel motivation and encourage the development of life skills needed to persevere through great obstacles. Check & Connect is a model intended to tip the balance in the lives of young people with emotional and behavioral challenges by building a relationship between these students and a caring adult focused on the youth's educational success. Check & Connect strives to strengthen the bonds between the student, family, school, and other members of the community to increase the likelihood that each student has a viable support network.

Check & Connect
Relationship Building: The Role of the Monitor

The role of the monitor is a cross between a mentor, advocate and service coordinator. One student described his monitor as "the person who says on my back about coming to school." Monitors stay with students and their families over a period of time, following them from building to building, year to year. The permanence of the monitor demonstrates to students a real and persistent commitment to school engagement, which drives home the message that staying in school is important. The monitor regularly checks students' attendance and academic performance, giving concrete feedback to the student and family about the young person's educational performance, mindful to communicate frequently with families about both good and bad news. A non-blaming approach is used to keep intervention efforts focused on resolution. While past efforts and mishaps are not overlooked, instead of searching for blame, the monitor works to create a new action plan and move forward. All these activities work to slowly earn the trust and confidence of the families, students and school staff. When students were asked how they knew they could trust their monitor, one student replied, "...because he showed up at my door step over the summer." Another student commented, "I knew I could really trust this person when I started classes at my new school, and there she was."

The monitor's job is to never give up on a student's educational attainment, nor permit the student to be distracted from the importance of school. The monitor is someone who knows the student's educational history, is familiar with the student's family background, and is available throughout the school year, summer, and into the next year. Each monitor reinforces the same message to students: A caring adult believes school is important. You can succeed, do the work, attend class, be on time, express frustration constructively, and stay in school. Monitors work to promote student's self advocacy and to avoid over dependence. Monitors help students acquire the skills and confidence needed to complete high school, using a five-step problem solving strategy, and acknowledging each step toward success. Monitors explicitly reinforce their expectation for students to finish high school.

A monitor working 40 hours per week carries a caseload of 40 to 50 students. The positions are staffed so monitors can follow students from building to building. The length of time a monitor works with a student ideally will continue for at least two years. In the best-case scenario, a monitor works with the same young person until the student has established a consistent pattern of school engagement. For students who do not attend school regularly, particularly youth for whom stability and consistency are not a typical component of daily life, the continuity provided by a monitor is reassuring and provides an informative resource for teachers and parents trying to meet the student's needs. When it is not possible to maintain the same monitor over time, the message to the student from a caring adult stays the same: you can succeed, be on time, attend classes, complete the work, express frustration in a constructive manner, and stay in school. Some students on a monitor's caseload have a strong connection with an adult in the school building; a special education case manager, hall monitor, custodian or coach. The monitor's role is not to replace established relationships, but to work with each key adult in the student's life in a process of supporting the student's engagement with school.

Effective monitors are hired for the following attitudes and abilities.

A belief that all children have capacity to learn.
A willingness to work closely with families using a non-blaming approach.
Advocacy skills, including the ability to negotiate, compromise, and confront conflict.
Good organizational skills.
The ability to accurately document intervention efforts.
The ability to work well independently in a variety of settings.

Monitors typically hold bachelor's degrees in a human services related field and have at least one to two years experience (paid and volunteer) working with youth and/or families. Monitors are provided weekly case consultation and ongoing supervision by project personnel, who are typically a school psychologist or special education teacher with the school district. This coordinator hooks monitors up to critical school and community resources, providing vital expertise regarding appropriate intervention and procedures, and lending legitimacy to the program among school staff. The learning curve for the monitoring position is steep. Timely technical assistance from the coordinator is essential, as is routine professional development. The program coordinator facilitates weekly to biweekly staff meetings. The meetings are used to review appropriate procedures and practices, exchange information about useful resources, provide case consultation, clarify roles in relation to other professionals, and develop strategies for communicating with other professionals and families. Time is made available for monitors to attend community and district workshops on topics ranging from transition planning, to mandated reporting, to problem solving and conflict resolution. Other administrative duties include processing new referrals, recruiting and hiring staff, managing the budget, and coordinating program evaluation.

Check & Connect
Checking: Supporting Students by Setting Educational Goals

"Checking" refers to a continual assessment of student engagement with school. The term engagement here refers to three types of indicators, including attendance (skipping classes, absenteeism), social/behavior performance (out-of-school suspension, other disciplinary consequences such as behavior referrals, detention, in-school suspension), and academic performance (course failures, accrual of credits). Although every school gathers such information, the data are not routinely used to systematically guide drop out prevention and school engagement efforts. A student is generally considered "disengaged" from school, if he or she meets one or more of the following conditions:

Skipping 15% or more of classes per month (18 classes per month).
Absent 15% or more days per month (3 days per month).
Suspended from school 2 or more days, for which the student is not allowed on school property for a defined number of days.
Other behavioral incidents 4 or more times per month, defined as consequences for inappropriate behavior, including detention, in-school suspension, and/or referrals to the office.
Failing a class, defined as 1 course failure (F) or no credit (NC) per grading period.
Behind in credits, earning less than 80% of possible credits per grading period and thereby not earning enough credits to graduate in at least 5 years.

The monitor's main source of information is school records. Information not available in files is obtained from several alternate sources, including attendance clerks, teachers, and assistant principals. These individuals are also consulted to verify contradictory information, as are students and parents. Anticipated time lines of data needs are routinely shared with attendance clerks, as are confidential lists of students currently in the program. Data requests for students in alternative settings, as well as for youth in short-term treatment/correctional settings, are directed to the program director or an established contact person, accompanied by the signed consent form. Checking these indicators of engagement, which are alterable and within the power of educators and parents to change, keeps the intervention efforts focused on students' educational progress.

Check & Connect
Connecting

Two levels of student-focused interventions are used to maximize finite resources: basic intervention, which is the same for all students and delivered at least one time per month, and intensive interventions, which are delivered more frequently and are individualized. All students received basic interventions (even if receiving intensive interventions), whereas those students who are "disengaged," as defined previously, also receive intensive interventions. Individual needs of the student and family dictate what specific intervention strategy is used. The two levels of intervention, guided by the "check" information, help the monitors to manage their time and resources more efficiently and responsively.

Check & Connect
Basic Intervention:
Strengthening Social Skills and Keeping School a High Priority

As a sustained preventive measure, basic intervention is administered to all targeted students. Basic intervention uses minimal resources in an effort to keep education a salient issue, especially after a working relationship has been established among the monitor, student, parents, and school staff. It begins with introductions, sharing general information about the monitor's role and the Check & Connect model with the student and his or her family. The substance of basic intervention is a monthly conversation with each student. The conversation covers the student's progress in school, the relationship between school completion and the "check" indicators of engagement, the importance of staying in school, and review of problem-solving steps to resolve conflict and cope with life's challenges. For problem solving, students are guided through real and/or hypothetical problems using a five step cognitive-behavioral problem-solving strategy:

Stop. Think about the problem.
What are the choices?
Choose one.
Do it.
How did it work?

Monthly conversations are a systematic opportunity for monitors to share information and reinforce skills that students need to actively promote their own connection with school, that may not be explicitly addressed during less formal contacts each week.

Intensive Intervention: Individualized Services for Students At Risk

Intensive interventions are targeted for "disengaged" students showing high risk in relation to any of the early warning signs of withdrawal. At least three-quarters of the students typically receive intensive intervention at any given time. Intensive interventions are tailored to the individual needs of the student and family, but can be characterized as falling into one of the following broad types: conflict resolution and coping strategies; academic support and assistance with alternate school completion routes; transition support including employment and post-secondary education, as well as recreation and community service exploration. While the intensive strategies are not unique from what other school staff may employ, the intervention is often met with less resistance from students. The long-term relationship between monitor and student may be one reason for this, but even more important, the monitor has the time to be persistent and to provide students with the information and encouragement needed to follow through on interventions and activities. Existing support services in the school and community are used as much as possible to promote the student's community participation and to minimize service duplication.

Check & Connect
Connecting with Family

Connect procedures also involve outreach to family members. While this procedure is described separately, in practice it is intertwined with student outreach efforts. Family members are brought into the process as resources and partners. A non-blaming approach is critical. Family members are contacted either by phone or home visit, as monitors seek to share and exchange information about their child's educational progress. Parent support for learning is promoted individually, as part of intensive interventions, as well as through opportunities offered to all targeted parents regardless of their child's level of engagement with school.

Individual interventions focus on minimizing education-related barriers identified by the family (e.g., communication between caregivers and school staff) or on facilitating access to resources that directly or indirectly promote the student's connection with school (e.g., helping the parent enroll younger children in Head Start so the older sibling is not kept home to babysit). A common intensive intervention among parents of children with emotional and behavioral challenges focused on helping caregivers, typically mothers, exchange ideas about alternative discipline strategies and how to set boundaries for their adolescents.

Check & Connect
Resource Requirements Summary

Population Receiving Services from Check & Connect

Check & Connect targeted two cohorts of 9th graders receiving special education services for a primary or secondary emotional and behavioral disability. Students were enrolled in one of the seven traditional urban high schools, with access to the general education curriculum (about 200 students total). Each high school served about 1,000 students. All the target students were randomly assigned to either the treatment or control group. Students were followed throughout the metro area over the project period (1996-2001) regardless of the change in educational setting or enrollment status.

Check & Connect Staff Position Titles Total Staff Time Duties

Check & Connect Monitors 100% FTE for every 40 students served Direct Service to students and families, data collection for program evaluation.

Project Coordinator 40% FTE Overall project management, program staff supervision and program evaluation.

1 Support Staff (personnel, payroll, etc...) Up to 25% FTE Data management, mileage reimbursement, and other clerical support.

Categories of Activities

Activity Category Staff Hours Required Staff Responsible

Program Administration, i.e. personnel, budget, payroll, reporting requirements. 6 hours/week combined Project Coordinator, Support Staff

Program Management, i.e. supervision, staff development, preserving treatment integrity 20 hours/week combined Project Coordinator, Monitors

Identifying and Targeting Students for Intervention 2 hours/week combined Project Coordinator, Monitors, School Staff

Deliver Check and Connect Intervention and maintain ongoing documentation. 38 hours/week combined Monitors

Program Evaluation 4 hours/week Project Coordinator, Monitors

Resource Requirements for Start-Up

Start-Up Duties Staff Responsible Time Required Supplies Required

Set up budget and subcontracts if needed. Project Coordinator, Staff 40 hours Computer access with appropriate software, paper, calculator, printer

Recruit and hire program staff. Project Coordinator, 64 hours Human resources services, newspaper ad, flyers, interview protocol, copier

Initial in-service for new staff. Project Coordinator, 40 hours In-service materials, folders, notepads.

Refine intervention for target sample with community input Project Coordinator, 40 hours Computer access, paper, printer, letterhead

Generate list of potential target students (with demographic contact information) after finalizing human subjects approval. Project Coordinator, School District Staff 60 hours Computer access, paper, disks, printer, letterhead.

Randomly select sample and collect parent permission. Project Coordinator, Monitors 1.5 hours per student, on average Computer access, letterhead, stamps, brochure, phones, copier, envelopes, mileage reimbursement.

Connect with school staff at building level to coordinate start-up. Project Coordinator.... Director, Monitors........ 25 hours Brochures, letterhead, paper, folders, copier, meeting space, food

Collect baseline data. Project Coordinator, Monitors 60 hours/ year Paper, computer access, copier, printer.

Develop program brochure and initiate other dissemination efforts. Project Coordinator, Support Staff 40 hours Computer access, paper, printer, transparencies.

Resource Requirements for Continuous Operations

Operations Duties Staff Responsible Time Supplies

Deliver Check and Connect Intervention. (Monitors tended to divide time thus: 50% with students, 15% with families, 20% with school staff, 15% other professionals and community workers.) Monitors 40 hours/week per 40 students Student/family outreach rewards at $20.00/ student/ year, voice mail, pager, mileage reimbursement, business cards, brochures

Program supervision and development, including ongoing staff development. Project Coordinator, 12 hours / week Voice mail, pager, mileage, reimbursement, resource directory, business cards, brochures, staff development materials, paper, copier, stamps, letterhead, computer

Program administration, such as budget reporting ongoing personnel and payroll Project Coordinator,
2 hours/week Computer access, paper, letterhead, stamps, phone, calculator

Program evaluation. Project Coordinator,
Monitors 6 hours/week combined Survey instruments, letterhead, computer access, file organizers, student and teacher access, access to student records.

DISCLAIMER. This project is supported by the U.S. Department of Education, Office of Special Education Programs (OSEP). Opinions expressed herein are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the position of the U.S. Department of Education.

Contact: Mary F. Sinclair, Ph.D. Institute of Community Integration, University of Minnesota, 150 Pillsbury Drive SE, 111 Pattee Hall, Minneapolis, MN 55455 sincl001@tc.umn.edu

Project Staff: Sandra Christenson, Carol Davis, David Evelo, Christine Hurley, Ruth Katz, Melissa Kau, Darnell Logan, Kathy Robison, Martha Thurlow and Deborah Westberry

SAFETY NET HOME

Check & Connect Staff Position Titles	Total Staff Time	Duties
Check & Connect Monitors	100% FTE for every 40 students served	Direct Service to students and families, data collection for program evaluation.
Project Coordinator	40% FTE	Overall project management, program staff supervision and program evaluation.
1 Support Staff (personnel, payroll, etc...)	Up to 25% FTE	Data management, mileage reimbursement, and other clerical support.

Activity Category	Staff Hours Required	Staff Responsible
Program Administration, i.e. personnel, budget, payroll, reporting requirements.	6 hours/week combined	Project Coordinator, Support Staff
Program Management, i.e. supervision, staff development, preserving treatment integrity	20 hours/week combined	Project Coordinator, Monitors
Identifying and Targeting Students for Intervention	2 hours/week combined	Project Coordinator, Monitors, School Staff
Deliver Check and Connect Intervention and maintain ongoing documentation.	38 hours/week combined	Monitors
Program Evaluation	4 hours/week	Project Coordinator, Monitors

Start-Up Duties	Staff Responsible	Time Required	Supplies Required
Set up budget and subcontracts if needed.	Project Coordinator, Staff	40 hours	Computer access with appropriate software, paper, calculator, printer
Recruit and hire program staff.	Project Coordinator,	64 hours	Human resources services, newspaper ad, flyers, interview protocol, copier
Initial in-service for new staff.	Project Coordinator,	40 hours	In-service materials, folders, notepads.
Refine intervention for target sample with community input	Project Coordinator,	40 hours	Computer access, paper, printer, letterhead
Generate list of potential target students (with demographic contact information) after finalizing human subjects approval.	Project Coordinator, School District Staff	60 hours	Computer access, paper, disks, printer, letterhead.
Randomly select sample and collect parent permission.	Project Coordinator, Monitors	1.5 hours per student, on average	Computer access, letterhead, stamps, brochure, phones, copier, envelopes, mileage reimbursement.
Connect with school staff at building level to coordinate start-up.	Project Coordinator.... Director, Monitors........	25 hours	Brochures, letterhead, paper, folders, copier, meeting space, food
Collect baseline data.	Project Coordinator, Monitors	60 hours/ year	Paper, computer access, copier, printer.
Develop program brochure and initiate other dissemination efforts.	Project Coordinator, Support Staff	40 hours	Computer access, paper, printer, transparencies.

Operations Duties	Staff Responsible	Time	Supplies
Deliver Check and Connect Intervention. (Monitors tended to divide time thus: 50% with students, 15% with families, 20% with school staff, 15% other professionals and community workers.)	Monitors	40 hours/week per 40 students	Student/family outreach rewards at $20.00/ student/ year, voice mail, pager, mileage reimbursement, business cards, brochures
Program supervision and development, including ongoing staff development.	Project Coordinator,	12 hours / week	Voice mail, pager, mileage, reimbursement, resource directory, business cards, brochures, staff development materials, paper, copier, stamps, letterhead, computer
Program administration, such as budget reporting ongoing personnel and payroll	Project Coordinator,	2 hours/week	Computer access, paper, letterhead, stamps, phone, calculator
Program evaluation.	Project Coordinator, Monitors	6 hours/week combined	Survey instruments, letterhead, computer access, file organizers, student and teacher access, access to student records.