Abstract
Scale-up of evidence-based universal prevention programs for student behavior, such as School-Wide Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports (SWPBIS), is important for improving K-12 education outcomes. While much research exists on factors affecting SWPBIS implementation, few studies have been conducted in rural schools. Here, we highlight practical lessons learned from a 3-year cluster-randomized trial in the U.S. studying implementation supports for the scale-up of SWPBIS in 40 rural K-12 schools in Idaho state. Schools in the trial either received Basic or Enhanced support (training only, or training + technical assistance and virtual learning community). Leveraging interview data from school implementers, event data collected during the trial, and School-wide Evaluation Tool data, we explore the following research questions: Which factors are frequently reported to impact SWPBIS implementation in rural schools, and what are actionable strategies that rural schools can use to overcome implementation challenges? Many of the factors that were reported to aid rural schools’ implementation corroborate previous findings from non-rural schools (leadership support, staff buy-in, team collaboration, and external/ongoing support). Rural school stakeholders additionally valued receiving technical assistance from a provider in-person initially and having like-minded peer collaborators in the virtual learning cohort. Additional strategies to facilitate rural school SWPBIS implementation are discussed.
Introduction
School-Wide Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports (SWPBIS) is a framework that schools can use to select evidence-based multi-tiered behavioral supports for students (Sugai & Horner, 2006). Previous studies have found that implementation of SWPBIS with fidelity (i.e., adhering to the practices outlined within the evidence-based intervention [Proctor et al., 2011]) can improve school climate (Bradshaw et al., 2009) and student academic and behavioral outcomes (Horner et al., 2009; Noltemeyer et al., 2019). However, schools’ ability to implement SWPBIS with fidelity depends on many factors.
Several recent reviews of literature have assessed what is known about successful implementation strategies for universal behavioral initiatives like SWPBIS, as well as common contextual barriers and facilitators of implementation (Baffsky et al., 2023; Fox et al., 2022). In their review of this literature, Fox and colleagues (2022) identified numerous facilitators and barriers of sustainment of SWBPIS implementation over 3 years or more with the aim of examining which factors were: (a) the most frequently mentioned; and (b) the most valuable for promoting or hindering implementation. The most frequently identified facilitators for sustainment were resources (including money and time), an effective implementation team, the use of data, and implementation with fidelity. The most frequently cited barriers included staff disagreement with the philosophy of SWPBIS, poor implementation fidelity, and lack of resources. Though fewer studies assessed in their review ranked the importance of these factors, the highest relative importance was attributed to leadership support, with additional factors including: use of data, fidelity of implementation, school demographic characteristics, staff buy-in, resources, team effectiveness, and ongoing training (Fox et al., 2022).
SWPBIS implementation is less common in rural schools. The number of schools implementing SWPBIS in the United States has grown over the last 20 years, with over 26,000 schools implementing SWPBIS (Chaparro et al., 2022). However, only 20% of schools using SWPBIS are rural schools (Chaparro et al., 2022), while rural schools represent 32% of all public schools in the United States (National Center for Education Statistics [NCES], 2022). Rural schools face unique SWPBIS implementation challenges. Rural school contexts differ from urban and suburban areas; rural schools often have fewer staff and less access to resources such as professional development and technical assistance, which can make implementing SWPBIS with fidelity more challenging. However, communities in rural areas can also be collaborative, tight-knit, and highly resilient (McDaniel & Bloomfield, 2020), which can support implementation success.
The literature base examining fidelity and sustainment of SWPBIS is broad and spans several decades, with in-depth single case studies (see Merle et al., 2022) as well as many observational, large-sample studies (Feuerborn et al., 2018; Mathews et al., 2014; Pinkelman et al., 2015). However, there is a distinct lack of research in the area of rural school implementation (Cavanaugh & Swan, 2015; Gage et al., 2022; Garbacz et al., 2022; McDaniel & Bloomfield, 2020), particularly research that provides school-level contextual data (such as from qualitative interviews), in addition to implementation fidelity data. Comprehensive, mixed methods research examining a breadth of facilitators and barriers, which incorporates perceptions from multiple stakeholders, and reports fidelity and sustainability data, is needed to help craft a fuller picture of determinants of implementation success in rural schools.
Purpose and Research Questions
In this study, we sought to address the gap in rich, mixed methods data on SWPBIS implementation in rural schools. We report lessons learned from a 3-year cluster-randomized controlled trial of SWPBIS implementation in rural Idaho schools. In these analyses, we leverage both study-assigned condition and implementation fidelity data to examine differences in barriers and facilitators reported by school SWPBIS coaches and the study’s SWPBIS Implementation Support Practitioners. We explored the following research questions: Which factors are frequently reported to impact SWPBIS implementation in rural schools, and what are actionable strategies that rural schools can use to overcome implementation challenges?
Methods
This cluster-randomized trial was designed to test a bundle of implementation supports to aid rural schools in implementing evidence-based interventions (SWPBIS was the intervention in this study). The trial took place over 3 years, from school years 2019–2020 to 2021–2022. For complete details of the study protocol, including COVID-19-related disruptions, see (Turner et al., 2022). This research was approved by the Institutional Review Board at Boise State University (protocol number 101-SB17-207).
Theoretical Framework
The study draws from the Quality Implementation Framework (QIF), which outlines implementation strategies at each stage of the implementation process (Meyers et al., 2012). The development of the QIF was partially informed by Fixsen and colleagues’ (2005) description of implementation stages, which have also been widely applied to SWPBIS implementation and scale-up (Horner et al., 2014). To further situate our results in previous evidence, we used the qualitative themes previously identified in the large-scale survey on SWPBIS adoption and sustainability conducted by McIntosh et al. (2014), and further refined in the review done by Fox and colleagues (2022), to deductively analyze qualitative data in the present study.
Sample
The sample included 40 public K-12 schools located in rural areas of Idaho. To be eligible for study inclusion, schools needed to: (a) be located in a rural area or township as designated by the NCES; (b) have at least 100 students enrolled; and (c) have no prior training in SWPBIS. Invitations to participate were mailed and emailed, and research staff called the schools to follow up. The principal and district administrator at participating schools completed a memorandum of understanding and a consent form. Schools were randomized to receive either basic support (Basic) or enhanced support (Enhanced) via coin flip. Chi-square and t-tests confirmed that demographic characteristics of schools were not significantly different between the two groups at baseline. The average size of schools by student/teacher population was just under 350 students and 19 teachers. Most were either rural remote (42.5%; more than 25 miles from a metropolitan area) or rural distant (40%; between 5 and 25 miles from a metropolitan area). Most were grades K-5 or K-8 schools (57.5%), with the remainder being middle schools (20%), high schools (10%), or grades K-12/PK-12 (12.5%). Schools served predominantly White (M = 77% SD = 16%) and Hispanic (M = 19% SD = 16%) student populations, with other races reported at ≤2% on average. Socioeconomic status varied between school populations, with 35% of schools at <40%, 42.5% of schools at 40% to 59%, and 22.5% of schools at ≥60% free/reduced price lunch eligibility. Demographic data were obtained from the NCES Common Core of Data (NCES, 2021).
Basic Condition
The basic supports received by all schools (n = 40) included (a) guidance (via phone) on assembling a building-level implementation team (including a designated SWPBIS coach and a school administrator) and (b) yearly trainings for the implementation team, starting with Tier 1 SWPBIS in Year 1, then Tiers 2 and 3 in Years 2 and 3, respectively. Trainings were provided over 3 to 4 days in the summers of 2019, 2020, and 2021, to school SWPBIS teams (anywhere from 3 to 8 schools attended a training; schools were separated by study condition). Trainings took place in-person for Year 1 and virtually in Years 2 and 3 due to COVID-19 restrictions. As part of each yearly training, all school teams were guided in using the Tiered Fidelity Inventory to assess all Tiers of their SWPBIS implementation (results reported elsewhere; see Calvert et al., 2025), which helped them focus their implementation efforts for the upcoming year.
Enhanced Condition: Rural School Support Strategies (RS3)
Enhanced supports were provided to half of the schools (n = 20) and are described below.
Technical Assistance
Technical assistance (TA) was provided monthly to school implementation teams, school coaches, or administrators, both proactively and as needed. Three Implementation Support Practitioners (ISPs; Albers et al., 2020) provided TA to the schools. For the first 4 months of the project, TA was provided in-person at each school, then transitioned online during the winter months when remote locations became difficult to access due to weather. While the TA was planned to continue in-person in spring 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic caused TA to be provided virtually (via teleconferencing/Zoom meeting, email, or phone call) for the rest of the trial. Typically, schools used TA in the form of having an ISP attend their implementation team meeting (in-person at first, then virtually). The ISPs helped teams troubleshoot any barriers to implementation, examine their behavior data, access resources, and stay accountable to their action plans, among other strategies. Though TA was offered monthly, schools differed in the amount of TA that they used. Averages for TA use in years 1, 2, and 3 were 10.1 ± 7 hours, 3.5 ± 1.5 hours, and 4.3 ± 2 hours, respectively.
Virtual Learning Collaborative
The virtual learning collaborative (VLC) was provided monthly during the school year. The 60-minute sessions were conducted online via teleconference and consisted of an equal mix of didactic lectures and group discussion, where attendees could troubleshoot with the ISPs and coaches from other RS3 schools. Sessions covered various SWPBIS implementation strategies, coaching strategies, and addressed personal health and stress management. The VLC sessions were attended by 12 coaches, on average.
Additional Year 1 Didactic Trainings
The coach and administrator at RS3 schools attended three additional in-person trainings during the first year. The first training focused on implementation planning, and the last two provided guidance for coaching school teams through SWPBIS implementation. Trainings were 8 hours long, and all RS3 schools attended.
Online Resources
RS3 schools were provided access to a password-protected web portal that hosted resources (e.g., videos, forms) curated by the ISPs. According to login data, utilization was very low, and mainly occurred after the ISPs had referred coaches to specific resources, rather than being independently sought out by coaches.
Background and Roles of Implementation Support Practitioners
Background
All ISPs were master’s-level or doctoral-level trained educators who previously served in various roles within grades K-12 education (6–25 years), and who had experience implementing SWPBIS in their schools. University staff provided ISPs with >60 hours of professional development on SWPBIS prior to and throughout the study.
Roles
During the first year, two ISPs conducted all trainings and VLC meetings and provided individualized TA to the 20 schools in the Enhanced condition. In the second and third years, a third ISP was the primary instructor for the Tier 2 and 3 trainings (which were virtual due to COVID-19). All ISPs provided TA to the schools in Years 2 and 3.
Measures
School-Wide Evaluation Tool (SET)
A trained research associate who was masked to the study condition performed a SET assessment at each school in the spring of 2022 (the end of the third year of implementation). The SET is widely used in SWPBIS evaluation and is considered the most objective tool for measurement of Tier 1 fidelity. It is recommended to use scores of 80% or higher on both the behavioral expectations taught subscale and the overall total as indicators of adequate Tier 1 fidelity (Horner et al., 2004). Fidelity of Tier 1 implementation has been shown to relate to positive changes in student outcomes (Grasley-Boy et al., 2022; Noltemeyer et al., 2019). The research associate plus a secondary rater (one of two trained SET evaluators) completed the assessments at 11/38 (29%) of the schools with an intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC) of .98. ICC estimates were calculated using SPSS version 26 (SPSS Inc, Chicago, IL) using a two-way mixed-effects model for consistency (Koo & Li, 2016).
Trial Events Log
Throughout the 3 years of the project, it was noted in the events log when key staff on a school’s SWPBIS team (the coach or the administrator) left the position or school. The log also indicated whether schools had a lot of staff turnover, were in a district with at least one other school implementing SWPBIS, and whether the school was planning to continue using SWPBIS after the trial’s conclusion. These factors were tracked to assess their relationship to implementation.
Coach Interviews
MM interviewed 36 of the 38 school SWPIS coaches (2 schools had dropped out by this time) during the spring of 2022, which was at the end of the third year of implementation. Two coaches were not responsive to interview requests. The semi-structured interviews inquired about leadership/administrator involvement, team meeting frequency and effectiveness, data systems, strategies for implementation, challenges to implementation, and outlook on continuing SWPBIS use. MM wrote debriefs summarizing the highlights from each interview as they were completed. Interviews were transcribed verbatim using Otter.AI (Mountain View, CA, USA), then MM checked the transcripts for accuracy.
Key Informant Interview
The three ISPs from the project were interviewed after the project was completed. Their close relationships with the school staff and observations on providing TA throughout the multi-year project made their opinions on successful strategies for facilitating PBIS implementation highly valuable. All three experts were interviewed together via teleconference (Zoom) in a semi-structured format, allowing each to state their responses to the questions. MM conducted the interview and HC observed the interview. The interview was transcribed verbatim using Otter.AI (Otter.AI, Mountain View, California, United States). MM checked the transcripts for accuracy.
Analyses
The present study used a convergent mixed methods design to explore data that was collected in the final year of the 3-year trial. Quantitative and qualitative data were collected concomitantly and mixed for synthesis during the analysis phase. To increase trustworthiness, data from the key informant interview with ISPs were used to triangulate the importance of the constructs from the coach interviews and quantitative data from Table 1, and to extract actionable strategies for improving SWPBIS implementation in rural schools.
Trial Events and School Characteristics, By Study Condition and Implementation Fidelity Group.
Note. Enhd. = Enhanced; BET = Behavioral Expectations Taught subscale; SET = School-Wide Evaluation Tool.
Quantitative
Four comparison groups were created using assigned study condition and implementation fidelity data, to explore patterns across groups in the implementation constructs (see Table 1). Within the study condition, schools that scored at or above 80% on both the behavioral expectations taught subscale and the overall SET score were assigned to “high fidelity implementation” groups, and those that scored below 80% for one or both were assigned to “low fidelity implementation” groups. Constructs listed in the table included events from the trial events log (occurred = 1; did not occur = 0) and school level (elementary school = 1; non-elementary school = 0). Frequency counts and percentages (within each group) are provided.
Qualitative
HC and MM used directed content analysis (Hsieh & Shannon, 2005) to code interview data from the school coaches and key informants. Directed content analysis leverages what is already known about a topic (SWPBIS implementation), allowing the ability to draw new inferences and extend what is known (unique issues and strategies for implementation in rural schools). Constructs from Fox and colleagues’ (2022) review of SWPBIS facilitators and barriers were first used to deductively code. Constructs included resourcing (initial training, time, money or staffing), fidelity of implementation, SWPBIS team function, leadership, data collection, collation and utilization, buy-in, ongoing training and support (this was combined with external expertise/support for our study), school characteristics, personal beliefs (teaching staff or administrator agreement with the underlying philosophy of SWPBIS), staff understanding about SWPBIS, family, student, or community involvement, prioritization and/or alignment with current practices, communication, adaptation, staff turnover, school climate and stress, community of practice (help from a network of peers implementing SWPBIS; this was the VLC in our study), district characteristics, involving new personnel, effectiveness, speed of initial implementation. Not all constructs were coded due to lack of mentions in the transcripts.
Researchers also used rapid qualitative analysis methodology to expedite the analysis process, as it has been shown to efficiently use time while having comparable outcomes to traditional qualitative methods when deductively coding implementation factors (Nevedal et al., 2021). HC and MM were involved with both quantitative and qualitative data collection in the schools across the 3 years of the trial and thus had familiarity with the schools’ contexts (i.e., prolonged engagement with the research setting), which aided the suitability of this approach. Consistent with the rapid analysis methodology, MM wrote interview memos directly after completing each interview with school coaches. Memos consisted of short narratives describing how each of the Fox et al. (2022) constructs discussed in the interview applied to that school, with illustrative quotes included as appropriate. HC then reviewed all interview transcripts, also coded the Fox et al. constructs, and created facility memos in the same manner. HC and MM met three times to reconcile code agreement and review and refine the memos into one-page, single-spaced memos for each school. During these meetings, the two coders discussed the code application process and refined the codebook, ensuring that their code application reached >90% agreement. These memos laid the groundwork for writing the qualitative results.
For the key informant interview, MM immediately created a post-interview summary of each construct from the Fox et al. (2022) review that was discussed. HC then used the same deductive coding strategy from the coach interviews to analyze the interview transcript. Once the Fox constructs were coded, HC inductively coded the text pertaining to each construct to extract applicable strategies for facilitating positive outcomes in that construct (e.g., strategies within leadership to improve SWPBIS implementation in rural schools). HC and MM then met to refine the narrative text of strategies for each construct.
Results
Quantitative Data From School-Wide Evaluation Too (SET) Scores, Trial Events Log, and School Characteristics
Table 1 shows descriptive statistics of schools across the four groups by SWPBIS fidelity and study condition. As shown, many of the Basic schools were struggling in the third year of implementation (13/20 did not meet high-fidelity implementation criteria; the behavioral expectations taught subscale was much lower on average than Enhanced schools), and two of the Basic schools had dropped out of the study by the end of Year 3, due to a combination of unforeseen staff changes and lack of administrator support. Half of the Enhanced schools (10/20) also did not meet the criteria for high-fidelity implementation. Ultimately, 50% of schools in the Enhanced condition were implementing SWPBIS with high fidelity after 3 years, while only 25% of Basic schools met high-fidelity criteria.
Notably, schools in the low-fidelity category from both study conditions experienced higher rates of staff turnover in key positions, such as the administrator or SWPBIS coach. Having other schools in the district implementing PBIS did not notably differ across all four groups. Additionally, schools that had high implementation fidelity were more frequently elementary schools, while schools with low fidelity were more equally split between elementary schools and schools containing higher grade levels (middle schools, high schools, and K-12 schools). Only low-fidelity schools reported that they would not continue with SWPBIS.
Qualitative Data From School Coach Interviews
School coaches (n = 36) participated in interviews with MM to provide information on how their implementation progress had gone throughout the study, particularly during the third year. By this time, two schools had dropped out. Additionally, two more schools could not be reached for an interview; thus, we did not receive information on what implementation challenges may have been occurring. Below are themes about the implementation process drawn from the interviews with school coaches.
Staff Buy-In
Coaches at schools with low implementation fidelity often cited that having staff-wide support for SWPBIS participation (i.e., teacher buy-in) was the main challenge to implementing SWPBIS. Several schools noted how a small number of teachers could negatively impact the culture for implementation. One coach said, “We are a really small school and one teacher can really shift the trajectory of an idea, and we have a couple teachers who just aren’t on board with PBIS and are very vocal about it.” Coaches spoke that newer teachers were usually more open to using SWPBIS, while more often, veteran teachers needed more communication of evidence before coming “on board.” Several coaches spoke of the balance between seeing positive effects of SWPBIS and teacher buy-in. At one school struggling with staff buy-in, the coach said, “The more success we see, the more buy-in, we’re gonna get. So, we’re working on it, we’re trying.” Another coach noted, “They’re believing in [SWPBIS] wholeheartedly at our school because they’ve seen positive things from it.”
When buy-in was high at schools, teachers reflected on why that was. One coach shared some strategies their team used for giving teachers positive recognition for using SWPBIS, At the end of every [SWPBIS team] meeting, we try to find three or four or five staff members who have been using the PBIS program well, that we’ve seen [using the PBIS strategies], or they’ve visited with us about something to do with it. And we just leave a little note on their desk so they know that we realize they’re using our program. I think it helps when we’re showing them that we appreciate what they’re doing with a little token.
SWPBIS Team Function
Almost all high-fidelity schools had a cohesive SWPBIS team that met regularly. One school coach, talking about their team, said “We’ve been fortunate, [we’ve] maintained the same team for the three years . . . we trust each other, we work together well.” Many coaches from high-fidelity schools spoke of the open lines of communication between the SWPBIS team and staff, including sharing out the behavioral data and making whole-staff decisions. They also discussed how important it was to have the principal attending and actively participating in the meetings. One coach discussed their team’s process, “We meet monthly. I facilitate, [and] I’m the note taker, [the Principal is] the information specialist. [The team] jobs after that. Then we put everything on Google Docs, and then we share everything out [with the staff].”
Leadership
Nearly all of the high-fidelity implementation schools were led by principals who were strong supporters of SWPBIS, showing the strength of supportive leadership for aiding successful implementation. These principals were described as highly involved in making SWPBIS run at the school, demonstrated by their attendance at team meetings, their communication of SWPBIS priorities to the school staff, and their follow-through with appropriate disciplinary consequences for students when behavioral expectations were not met. One school, describing the administrator’s support, paraphrased the principal’s words: “‘We are doing this, I don’t care which staff member doesn’t like it, this is the system. You can buck the system if you want to. But this is the system and you will use it.’” Another coach echoed that the principal’s heavy involvement and enthusiastic support was key to implementation success, Our principal is [on the Tier 1, Tier 2, and Tier 3 teams]. So he is right in there. And he is like, ‘this has to work, and this is what we’re gonna do, and this is why it works, and it’s amazing.’ So he sees all of the benefits. . .He’s one of our biggest cheerleaders to be honest with you. He just wants to see it continue.
Staff Turnover, School Climate, and Stress
For some schools, strains on the staff were a prominent hindrance to SWPBIS implementation. Often, these challenges boiled down to not having time or energy to dedicate to the implementation of SWPBIS, due to things like burnout and staff turnover. Notably, the COVID-19 pandemic happened during the first year of implementation for schools in this study, which disrupted all schools’ functioning and contributed to staff burnout, but some schools bounced back more easily than others. The coaches from some schools described having particularly challenging behaviors among students, which coincided with low morale and burnout among staff. One coach at a junior high/middle school described, “It’s almost like we’re on survival mode around here. We’ve had a lot of parents that don’t support us. They believe their children and not the teachers . . . it’s been a really rough year.”
Some schools noted that high staff turnover impeded SWPBIS implementation, since getting the new staff caught up on SWPBIS policies was difficult to keep up with. This echoes the quantitative data from the trial events log, showing that schools with higher turnover more frequently struggled with low implementation fidelity. One coach described their challenges to keep SWPBIS moving forward in a year with a high rate of staff absences due to burnout, “We’ve had people that have been gone consistently, and it has put a lot of pressure on teachers, especially on [the SWPBIS] team. We’re a small school . . . [and it’s] like we’re flying by the seat trying to keep everything together.” Another coach noted the lack of time to dedicate to following up with practices to keep implementation rolling smoothly, The biggest fall back on all of our things is the follow through though. It’s like we’ll get something started and have a lot of buy-in and that, but then just the follow up of it. We would miss that last piece.
External Expertise/Ongoing Suppor
School coaches at Enhanced schools had differing perceptions about the implementation supports, namely the TA and VLC. Most Enhanced school coaches reported valuing the TA given by the SWPBIS experts, saying it helped them overcome barriers. One coach noted, “They’re that outside perspective that when you’re in the trenches, and you just don’t know which way to turn, they can just say one little thing. And you’re like, oh, yeah, I didn’t think of it like that.” Another coach brought up that they appreciated the accountability of having someone checking in on their progress, saying “ When I see that coming up on the calendar, it just keeps me in line for did I meet that checkpoint, that goal that we had last time ?”
Coaches’ opinions on the VLC sessions were mixed, with some really liking the camaraderie they developed with the coaches from other schools, and some expressing that conflicting schedules made the VLC sessions difficult to attend regularly. One coach said, I really like being able to collaborate with other coaches, and hear that, okay, we’re not the only ones in this boat, or I have this problem, what have your schools tried? . . . it’s people that are in the day to day with you. . . I’ve loved having the support of someone that really does understand what you’re going through.
Data Collection, Collation, and Utilization
Issues around agreement on a consistent behavior tracking method were common at low-fidelity schools. These issues ranged from teacher participation in tracking and submitting behavior data, to having a dedicated person to perform data entry into a software program, to accomplishing team data review. One coach at a low-fidelity school talked about their issues with data tracking, “We dropped a lot of the paperwork side of it. We found it really, really hard for teachers to be on the same page [about reporting behavior].” Another coach noted their struggles with teachers participating in the data reporting for Tiers 2 and 3.
No one wanted to do referrals, because they didn’t want to contact the parent. So nothing was being tracked. And so then [the teachers] would come and complain about behaviors, and we’d go into the system, and there’s nothing reported . . . We had a student that needed to be on “check-in, check-out,” and we were not able to because we didn’t have documentation to show that he was struggling.
Nearly all high-fidelity schools had a system in place for consistently collecting and tracking student behavior data, as well as entering the data into a computer program. One coach talked about the power of sharing data at school-wide meetings so that teachers could collectively brainstorm solutions, We talk about. . .Where is [the behavior] happening? What do we need to do to make it better? Which grade level has the most? . . .so we bring out all of the wonderful little reports that we can and talk to them.
Qualitative Data From Implementation Support Practitioners Interview
The following section presents constructs from Fox and colleagues’ (2022) list of SWPBIS implementation facilitators and barriers that came up in both the coach interviews or trial events log and the ISP interview. The data from each source are discussed in tandem to show the full picture of both (a) what happened with schools’ SWPBIS implementation and (b) the opinions of ISPs, who supported schools throughout the 3-year period. Rural school implementation strategies from the ISP interviews are also discussed within each section.
SWPBIS Team Function
The school coach interview data showed that having a well-functioning team, such as one that regularly met and was cohesive, was an important component for success. All high-fidelity schools had a well-functioning SWPBIS team. However, while there was good teamwork in some low-fidelity schools, it was not enough to ensure SWPBIS implementation with fidelity. The ISPs also discussed the importance of the SWPBIS team for implementation, saying even in the face of less support from the principal or the district, “A strong team can do a lot.” ISPs noted several strategies related to team structure and proactive activities:
While turnover isn’t always able to be controlled, another noted element among successful teams was keeping members consistent year to year, “[Schools that did well] had team stability, even if they rotated people through, they kind of kept that core team.”
Having a good meeting agenda and an action plan, meeting minutes, and using data . . . that was the secret sauce. I love when I jump into a team meeting and they’ve got their [behavior tracking] graphs printed and they’re ready to talk about them.
An action plan keeps the team accountable for meeting goals and can be used to assign tasks to complete before the next meeting. An ISP explained, “It needs to be a living document, not just something you fill out at the first meeting of the year and then don’t touch for the rest of the year.” An agenda contributes to meeting efficiency, and minutes are great for team members to refer to between meetings, or for members who were not able to attend the meeting.
Leadership
The school coach interviews demonstrated the importance of having a supportive school leader; quality SWPBIS implementation required a building administrator who was at least supportive, and preferably also involved in all aspects of SWPBIS (trainings, planning, team meetings, and communication with staff). The ISPs spoke of the importance of both the administrator and the SWPBIS coach’s role in implementation. One ISP said, “It’s imperative that the principal and the coach work hand in hand. I just don’t know how you can do it successfully, if one is working without the other.” and “I could see a coach carry [implementation] or an admin carry it, if the other one was willing. But the ones that I saw stand out the most were the ones where they were both all in.” There was one strategy discussed by the ISPs to increase administrator buy-in:
Turnover
Evidenced in Table 1 and in the ISP interviews was the high potential of staff turnover to disrupt SWPBIS implementation. One ISP described administrator changes in the Basic schools, saying, “That really created some speed bumps or just some total cliffs for schools that [stopped] . . . or [the turnover] put SWPBIS on pause for six months to a year.” For the Enhanced schools, a few were able to continue with high-fidelity implementation despite changes in key personnel, which one ISP attributed to the consistent connection they had through the ISP support relationship. To underscore conclusions from the Leadership construct, it’s imperative that new administrators coming on are supportive of SWPBIS. There were no strategies coded for Turnover.
External Expertise/Ongoing Support
The quantitative data (see Table 1) showed that for half of the schools receiving the enhanced supports, the supports were not enough for them to achieve high fidelity amid high turnover rates of key staff and philosophical differences with the SWPBIS system. However, the supports were still a powerful aid, as twice the number of schools receiving them reached high fidelity compared to basic the support schools. One ISP explained how the support was valuable, The biggest thing we learned is that schools want and need follow up support after training. Some schools can get away without having it if they have enough district support or committed individuals, but even those ones will still tell you “We wanted it. It would have helped. We did it in spite of it, but it would have been helpful.”
The other ISPs agreed, adding remarks that they heard coaches say, like “If you hadn’t pestered us every month about our team meeting, we probably wouldn’t have had it, you being there and you wanting to be a part of it helped keep us moving regularly.” The ISPs reported many lessons learned about offering SWPBIS implementation assistance:
Another ISP, who was also a school principal, sent out a monthly email to the coaches and principals, “With a few tips and suggestions based on what I was experiencing as a principal in a building and things that are helpful to me.” Sometimes, a coach would respond back and ask for a particular form or resource to follow up. The third ISP weighed in, “I always try to get them to focus on what’s important, like where do you want to be in June? How would you feel successful? How are we going to get there?” In their communications, providing some prompt about goal-setting or revisiting a challenge from the last time they talked help jumpstart a conversation. To facilitate this, the ISPs keep a log of what TA had been given the last time.
District Characteristics
Having another school in the district implementing SWPBIS did not consistently relate to success for schools in our study. While it is helpful for schools to “Have other schools in the district be thought partners with them, and to be able to talk about district-level kinds of pieces,” there are also other specific supports that districts can provide, which were not directly measured within our study (these are described below). The ISPs additionally touched on the notion of long-term sustainability of SWPBIS, saying that a building-level team can get a lot accomplished, but over time, the continued priority of SWPBIS within the district really matters for keeping SWPBIS going in schools. The ISPs suggested several strategies that rural districts can use to support SWPBIS implementation:
The next person hired, that [should be] one of the expectations of the person coming in. Rather than, ‘Okay, we’ll just hire this person and see if they’re on board with SWPBIS then,’ it is, “Hey, the school is a SWPBIS school. What do you know about it? What are you willing to learn about it? And how can you make that happen when you come in?”
Discussion
Our results show that rural schools implementing SWPBIS have distinct features that warrant specific and tailored implementation supports, in addition to having implementation challenges that many schools face. Previous research shows that proactive school leaders and SWPBIS teams are key to SWPBIS implementation success (Fox et al., 2022), and this was also shown for rural schools in our study. The buy-in and active support of the principal were paramount for implementing SWPBIS with fidelity. The ISPs had several suggestions for fostering buy-in among school principals, including leveraging testimonials and connections with other trusted school leaders who were successfully implementing SWPBIS (often in other rural schools). Ideally, each principal also works in tandem with an active SWPBIS team in the building to accomplish their goals, but our data showed that even in the absence of enthusiastic principal involvement, a team can still advance implementation. Strategies for helping teams make implementation progress include having regular meetings and reviewing/using behavioral data to make informed decisions about school practices.
Other frequently reported implementation barriers for rural school staff centered around staff issues, with coaches citing lack of buy-in among staff and burnout. These problems were more frequently reported at low-fidelity schools. Lack of staff buy-in is a primary barrier to any organizational change in schools (Pinkelman et al., 2015; Scaletta & Tejero Hughes, 2021). It is clear from our data that school leaders supporting SWPBIS (and clearly communicating SWPBIS as a priority) was related to staff’s supportive beliefs. Exploring the effectiveness of specific strategies to increase buy-in among school staff at rural schools, including how discrete leadership actions can affect staff beliefs, is an important topic for future research.
Another staff issue, particularly for low-fidelity schools, was high turnover rates both among general staff and staff in key SWPBIS leadership positions. Rural schools across the U.S. tend to struggle with teacher retention due to lower rates of compensation and fewer resources (Versland et al., 2020). For our study, the COVID-19 pandemic may also have increased stress, burnout and turnover among school staff starting in 2020 (Bradshaw et al., 2024). However, the challenges of the pandemic were similar across all schools in this study, and some schools had relatively little turnover of staff. While we cannot infer causality, we suspect that schools that achieved high-fidelity SWPBIS implementation before the pandemic shutdown may have been better prepared as an organization for the challenges of the pandemic. Previous evidence shows that high-fidelity PBIS implementation is associated with a more positive school climate (Bradshaw et al., 2009), which can aid in staff retention.
Research on providing ongoing support to schools (e.g., training and consultation/coaching), including prior evidence from this trial (Calvert et al., 2025), demonstrates that the support improves implementation of social-behavioral interventions in schools (Baffsky et al., 2023; Fox et al., 2022). It has also been demonstrated that the relationship between ISPs (the support providers in our study) and implementers is vital for establishing effective collaboration between the two parties (Albers et al., 2022). Several elements were key to ISPs in our study developing good working relationships with rural school stakeholders. Rural schools are often in remote areas, and even though virtual meeting platforms were widely available at the start of our study, in-person school visits from the ISP were highly valued by rural school personnel and helped establish trusting relationships early on. Being visited on their home turf made school staff feel valued and see SWPBIS as a school priority. ISPs provided assistance virtually after the first year of SWPBIS implementation, but the support went much more smoothly when they had established that initial rapport with the team (especially the school principal) in-person. Our previous findings showed that TA from the ISPs was also highly acceptable in part due to their credibility from previously working in Idaho schools (Calvert et al., 2023). Thus, when providing implementation support for scale-up in rural areas, it is important to consider how well the backgrounds of ISPs fit with the contexts and needs of the schools.
Schools in rural areas with smaller populations are more likely to combine many grades within a single school (such as K-12 schools). In our study, a greater proportion of schools achieving lower fidelity scores were secondary or combined schools. While implementation supports appeared to help more Enhanced secondary schools succeed compared to Basic schools, they still struggled. This is consistent with prior research showing that schools containing Grades 6 or 7 and up have more difficulty implementing SWPBIS with fidelity (McIntosh et al., 2015). Rural school staff also often take on more responsibilities in their schools because there are fewer staff members, which poses additional challenges for staff capacity to implement. We found that it was valuable to connect implementers across schools via the VLC. School coaches learned from peers in similar positions at other rural schools who understood their struggles and could help them troubleshoot common implementation barriers. This adds evidence to growing literature showing that state or regional learning collaboratives for school mental health professionals can be valuable outlets for resource sharing and connection among schools (Orenstein et al., 2023).
Sustainment of SWPBIS
SWPBIS is sustainable when it is institutionalized into the school’s culture, policies, and practices in such a way that would allow implementation to continue over time (Proctor et al., 2011). In our study, a few school coaches mentioned in interviews that their schools had adopted a “culture of SWPBIS,” but it did not come up systematically enough to draw conclusions about what factors contributed to sustainability. Notably, all schools from Basic and Enhanced groups that met high-fidelity criteria for Tier 1 SWPBIS elected to continue SWPBIS implementation the next year. This suggests that fidelity may be an important component for the sustainment of SWPBIS, as previously shown (Fox et al., 2022). The ISPs, whose experiences span not only from 3 years of the trial but also from their previous professional experience, viewed that district-level practices help schools sustain SWPBIS implementation in the long term, especially when fidelity-supporting practices are in place at the school level. Supportive district-level practices include having policies and hiring practices that support SWPBIS (i.e., district leaders hire any new leadership positions with SWPBIS implementation in mind), having protected time for SWPBIS team meetings and professional development, and having consistency across all schools district-wide on both behavioral expectations and the paperwork used for data reporting. In rural communities that often have small districts and few schools, sharing standard values, as well as practices and paperwork, can save staff time and increase unity across the schools.
Limitations of the study include that the key informant interview was a single, panel interview, leading to potential confirmation bias among members. We were also unable to present data on the implementation of Tiers 2 and 3 due to variable implementation among schools after pandemic disruptions. Additionally, researchers did not engage in member checking with school coaches. The breadth of qualitative and quantitative data sources was a study strength.
Conclusions
Many of the factors that support rural schools’ SWPBIS implementation are similar to those found in previous literature for non-rural school samples (e.g., leadership, buy-in, team collaboration, and external/ongoing support [Fox et al., 2022]). However, there are unique considerations for rural schools that can make implementation strategies more successful. Connecting rural schools in an implementation cohort was highly valuable, as was providing flexible TA from ISPs, both in-person and virtually. Schools valued that ISPs were approachable and knowledgeable, without passing judgment. Schools that received only the yearly trainings for the SWPBIS team (which included a self-evaluation of implementation) also accomplished high fidelity when the building leader was supportive and committed to SWPBIS implementation, and the implementation team was dedicated and well-organized.
Footnotes
Acknowledgements
We would like to thank all the staff and students from Idaho schools that participated in our research. We also extend our thanks to Tate Castleton, who was an integral member of our school support team.
Funding
This study was funded by the National Institute of Justice, #2017-CK-BX-0021.
Declaration of Conflicting Interests
The authors declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Trial Registration
This research was prospectively registered on ClinicalTrials.gov (NCT03736395), on November 9, 2018, as “Scaling up Schoolwide Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports (SWPBIS) in Rural Idaho Schools.”