The System to Enhance Educational Performance (STEEP): Using Scienceto Improve Achievement

Abstract

The System to Enhance Educational Performance (STEEP) is a program that provides a blueprint for implementation of response to intervention (RTI). RTI has been defined as the practice of "(a) providing high quality instruction/intervention matched to student needs and (2) using learning rate over time and level of performance to (3) make important educational decisions" (NASDSE, 2006, p. 5). In other words, RTI is a process for gathering data, applying decision rules, and making decisions. As a generic process, RTI may include various types of screening procedure, decision-making processes, and, interventions. Implementation and decision-making with RTI by professionals using a problem-solving model may differ from case to case and school to school. STEEP represents a specific set of decision rules and procedures that, together, help to opera-tionalize the RTI process. The purpose of this chapter is to describe the empirical and epistemological foundation for STEEP. STEEP is a research-based RTI model. STEEP consists of a series of assessment and intervention procedures with specific decision rules to detect and remediate students with academic deficits in reading, mathematics, or writing in kindergarten through eighth grade. STEEP begins with screening , which utilizes curriculum-based measurement (CBM). Decision rules are applied to screening data to determine whether or not there is a Tier 1 or core curriculum problem. If so, then classwide problems are addressed with classwide intervention. If a Tier 1 problem is not present or has been successfully resolved with intervention, then a subset of students are identified to participate in a brief assessment of the effect of incentives on child performance. Decision rules are then applied to the results of the per-formance/skill deficit assessment and students are matched to either a skill or performance intervention. For skill deficit students, a standard protocol is used to select and implement an appropriate intervention. Progress monitoring data are used to determine whether or not the intervention response was adequate or inadequate. Hence, STEEP is a set of procedures that functions to detect and assist students who might benefit from academic intervention. Interventions are quickly delivered and monitored for effectiveness. 26.1 Background and Original Problem The purpose of schooling is to assist students to acquire academic proficiency. It follows, then, that a major problem for schools occurs when students do not achieve the academic skills that schools have been entrusted to impart. Such students have always been present in schools, and educators have struggled with the question of how best to respond to their needs. In the 1980s there was increased use of special education as a solution for the problem of low achievement. It was assumed that students who were intellectually capable and yet had significant achievement deficits must have a specific learning disability (SLD), and SLD classification became a widely used tool for the problem of low achievement. The classification of students as having an SLD was viewed as positive for all: good 343