Practice-based evidence for children and adolescents: Advancing the research agenda in schools.

School psychologists are increasingly aware of the contributions that have occurred in psychology and education around the evidence-based practice (EBP) movement. This movement has a rich historical context of linking science and clinical care dating back to the work of Lightner Witmer (Kratochwill, Morris, & Robinson, 2008). Building on the ground-breaking evidence-based intervention work of American Psychological Association (APA) Divisions 12 and 53 (e.g., Weisz & Hawley, 1998), the APA initiated a Presidential Task Force on Evidence-Based Practice in 2005. A report of that task force emphasized that various forms of research evidence can affect practice and can emphasize the importance of clinical expertise and judgment in providing psychological care (American Psychological Association Presidential Task Force on Evidence-Based Practice, 2006). The American Psychological Association Task Force on Evidence-Based Practice for Children and Adolescents (2008; hereafter called the "Task Force") was formed to build on the work of the Presidential Task Force to reduce the research-to-practice gap and promote evidence-based interventions in school psychological services, but with a special focus on the unique factors influencing children, adolescents, and their families. The authors of this article were members of the Task Force. The Task Force was guided by four principles (see Table 1) to conceptualize the integration of research and practice and a broader systemic orientation to improve overall mental health and educational care. We approached the issues from a broad metasystemic orientation with the goal of providing a framework that would encompass quality improvement and public health. The components of the framework are outlined in Figure 1. We argued that a metasystems perspective is critical to both understanding children's mental health needs and delivering services with enhanced outcomes. In our Task Force report, we discussed the key components of a systems approach for children and adolescents with emotional and behavioral needs and subsequently outlined key components of this "metasystem" for children (Kazak et al., 2010), which we defined as the various contexts and environments that surround and influence a child's adaptations and development. The core contexts that typically exert the most direct influence on children include their family; the cultural norms and values of their heritage; their peers; social institutions created to inculcate certain societal values (such as churches or schools); and for children with emotional or behavioral needs, the various systems that society creates to provide services to address these problems. (p. 86) The service systems include pediatric health care, specialty mental health, juvenile justice, child protection, and substance abuse settings, and of course, schools. Around the time that the EBP movement gained prominence in school psychology, the response to intervention (RTI) initiative was developing in education and has now influenced the provision of school-based psychological practice in major ways. RTI is a system of service delivery through which interventions are delivered that combine services for children in a multitiered prevention framework with ongoing progress monitoring of academic and/or behavioral targets at each of the levels of tiers (Glover, DiPerna, & Vaughn, 2007; Reschly & Bergstrom, 2009). In this regard, RTI represents a convergence of evidence-based interventions and several components represented in the tradition of prevention practice (e.g., screening, multitiered interventions; see Lembke et al., 2010, for an example context for reading research within an RTI model). [FIGURE 1 OMITTED] In part because of federal mandates and in part because of political influences, RTI was presented as a format for educational and psychological services to children in regular and special education. …