KleinCollinsHigh School
20811 Ella Blvd Spring, TX 77388 832-484-5233 Fax: 832-484-5221
Special Education Department
The PASS Program: A Positive Approach to Student Success
The PASS program is founded on the belief that children with emotional and behavioral disabilities benefit behaviorally from educational experiences with non-handicapped peers and academically from participation in the general curriculum. Designed by a behavior specialist and a licensed psychologist who together have over 40 years of educational experience, PASS was developed to provide students with serious emotional disturbance individualized programming that incorporates “best practices” in serving youth with SED.
Program methodology focuses on teaching/coaching students to behave appropriately in general education or resource classrooms with the help of a teacher trained as a Behavior Specialist. The program is implemented in three phases – (1) Pre-Placement, (2) Orientation (3) Maintenance and Inclusion – followed by a provision for Aftercare.
Phase 1 incorporates activities prior to PASS placement, such as ensuring that the less intensive and restrictive interventions have occurred; development of a Behavior Intervention Plan (BIP) targeting the 2-3 behaviors which interfere most with the student’s academic and behavioral progress and, formal placement in PASS by an Admission, Review, and Dismissal (ARD) committee.
In Phase 2, the primary PASS focus is on instruction. Instruction is provided regarding: PASS classroom expectations; the PASS monitoring and reinforcement systems; social skills in the area(s) targeted by the student’s BIP; and, academic work provided by the mainstream teacher. This phase is brief and individualized. The setting for these services is the PASS classroom.
Phase 3 moves the student from the PASS classroom into general education or resource settings. Monitoring and coaching of student behavior occurs on a schedule designed to meet individual student needs. Reinforcement of behavioral success is a key component of the phase and social skills instruction/coaching continues. After a period of behavioral success with the Behavior Specialist providing monitoring, students move on to self-monitoring.
Movement by the student through the second and third phases of PASS is not perceived as linear; rather, the level of services a student receives is fluid and dependent on their current behavioral needs. Students may, therefore, move from PASS monitoring to self-monitoring. Data collection and behavior analysis form the level of service provided throughout these phases.
Theoretical research and legal support for placing students with an emotional disturbance in inclusive environments derives from the work of the social learning theory of Albert Bandura (1977) and the social-ecological theory of Urie Bronfenbrenner (1989). Specifically, these theories emphasize the impact of environments (including peer groups) on behavior. Additionally, the program’s practice of placing students in inclusive settings is influenced by research (Dishion T., Spracklen K., Patterson, G., 1996) indicating the presence of a “latrogenic effect”, that is, antisocial groups placed together become more antisocial. Legal support for inclusive practices is provided by Brown vs. Board of Education (1954) and IDEA Amendments (1997).