Adaption for Individual Differences

(2 items) 2 2 2 100% 2 2 2 100% 2 2 2 100% 4. General Instruction Environment (3 items) 2 2 2 67% 2 3 3 89% 2 3 3 89% 5. English Language Development (10 items) 7 6 7 67% 9 9 8 87% 10 9 8 90% 6. Content Specific to Reading/Language/Art (6 items) 4 4 4 67% 5 5 4 78% 6 5 5 89%

Total Raw Score 22 22 23 27 28 26 29 28 28

Average Percentage by Tier 70% 84% 89%

multiplied by 100 (Gast, 2010, p. 159; see Appendix D). Percent agreement was

calculated for each Tier and overall. In all nine observations, the IRR ranged from 90 to 100%; the overall average IRR for all observations was 96%.

As shown in Table 5, Tier 1 was implemented with a lower percentage of fidelity (i.e., 70%) since some items were not checked as being observed. Fidelity in Tier 1+2 was higher (i.e., 84%). This may have been due to the fact that each of the GETs had one to two teacher assistants helping them conduct the small group instruction carried out in those Tiers (see Table 1 in Chapter III).

During Tier 1 and Tier 1+2, students identified as SES or classified as ELLs stayed in the general education classroom with their peers. However, during Tier 2 intensive, those students were pulled out of the classrooms to receive Tier 3 provided by the SET or SLP as small group and/or one-on-one services. Therefore, in addition to the extra assistants, the GETs had fewer students during the Tier 2 intensive time; students were also clustered across grade levels based on similar needs on the DIBELS and TRC, making the groups more homogeneous. These factors singly or together may have resulted in a higher percentage of fidelity (i.e., 89%). Still, the percentage of implementation fidelity overall was an acceptable 81%.

Team Meeting Observations

One of the main components of the RTI program at this school was the weekly RTI team meeting (i.e., IST committee), which was where all of the key RTI decisions were made. The team meeting was also important because it was the place where all staff who played a role in the RTI process came together, making the evaluation of individual

roles and group functioning at least potentially possible (Keller-Margulis, 2012; Shapiro et al., 2012). Indeed, GETs had to document what had been done with each child in Tier 1, Tier 1+2, and Tier 2 intensive; any student who was not responding adequately to the intervention in the general education classroom had to be referred to the RTI team meeting. During the RTI team meeting, each member would also have access to the referred student’s online PEP in order to collaboratively review and evaluate the student’s performance, as well as the effectiveness of the intervention based on the student’s data. The team then made a decision to either set up further goals and interventions or refer the student to more testing by the psychologist.

Fidelity of Team Meeting

The researcher observed two RTI team meetings, and in each meeting, used the team meeting observation format adapted from Martin et al. (2006), along with a comprehensive field note taking strategy (Wolfinger, 2002). In order to increase the trustworthiness of the team meeting findings, all of the team meeting observation forms along with the comprehensive field notes taken were checked with the chair of the committee (i.e., participant checking). Also, the team meeting observation forms, as well as the comprehensive field notes were checked with a doctoral student in the department of SES who had experience working in American K-12 public school for eight years, and had four years of experience as a co-chair of RTI implementation committee at the school level (i.e., peer checking) (Creswell, 2013; Maxwell, 2013; Quimby, 2012; see Table 2 in Chapter III).

By observing two RTI team meetings, the researcher collected data regarding the collaborative decision-making efforts of teaching and non-teaching personnel who were part of the RTI implementation process, including those who did not have a hands-on role like the GETs and SETs (i.e., psychologists and counselors). Also, the researcher was able to gain insightful data regarding the other five critical components of RTI, namely (a) universal screening and progress-monitoring, (b) data-based decision making, (c) criteria to determine unresponsive, (d) multidisciplinary evaluation, and (e) special education, that could not be observed during the classroom observations (Fuchs & Fuchs, 2007; see Figure 1 in Chapter II). These notes are summarized in Table 6.

The RTI team meetings were conducted in the Guidance office and were attended by five educators: one GET who had referred a student for reading, one who had referred a student in math, the SET/interventionist, the psychologist, and the counselor who was the chair of the RTI committee. All the educators were white and only one member was male. The goal of the two meetings was to make a decision regarding one student in second grade who had both health and academic issues and was referred by two GETs; the student was performing well below grade level in reading, writing, and math. After reviewing the student’s PEP and all the data collected regarding his performance (i.e., DIBELS, TRC, and Common Core standards), each of the committee members had the opportunity to contribute and share his/her data, as well as their thoughts regarding the student’s performance. Both referring GETs were asked several questions by other members of the RTI team regarding what they did with the student in the classroom and why they thought the student was not making progress in the current intervention.

Table 6

RTI Team Meeting Observations

Critical Components of RTI Examples from RTI Team Meeting Observation

1. Universal Screening &