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Sustainability of Teacher Implementation of School-Based Mental Health Programs

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Abstract

Evidence-based prevention and intervention programs are increasingly being implemented in schools and it therefore is becoming increasingly important to understand the complexities of program implementation under real-world conditions. Much research has focused on the contextual factors that influence program implementation but less work has attempted to provide an integrated understanding of mechanisms (e.g., teacher-training processes) that affect teachers' program implementation. In this paper, we review literature on factors related to teachers' implementation of school-based prevention and intervention programs, then from this review abstract what we believe are four basic ingredients that characterize potentially sustainable teacher-implemented classroom programs. Finally, we present a sequential model, based on these ingredients, of the naturalistic processes underlying sustainability of teachers' program implementation and describe how this sustainability can be enhanced through provision of teacher training and performance feedback from a classroom consultant.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute for Public Policy Studies, Vanderbilt University, USA

    Susan S. Han

  2. Department of Psychology and Human Development, Vanderbilt University, USA

    Bahr Weiss

  3. Vanderbilt Institute for Public Policy Studies, 1207 18th Avenue South, Nashville, Tennessee, 37212

    Susan S. Han

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  1. Susan S. Han
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Correspondence to Susan S. Han.

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Han, S.S., Weiss, B. Sustainability of Teacher Implementation of School-Based Mental Health Programs. J Abnorm Child Psychol 33, 665–679 (2005). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10802-005-7646-2

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