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Portfolio Artifact Descriptions

Psychoeducational Assessment Report

A comprehensive psychoeducational assessment of a multilingual (Spanish/English) student uses the RIOT method of data collection and integrates multiple sources to describe a student's current cognitive, academic and socioemotional functioning. This report will take a holistic, strengths-based, child-centered approach to standardized assessment by summarizing findings from multiple methods and sources (e.g., observations, interviews, record reviews, direct assessment) when determining special education eligibility. Additionally, it articulates the assets of multilingualism and of maintaining heritage language and culture while also developing skills linguistically and culturally represented in U.S. schools—which may highlight issues of inequity.

Systems-level Needs Assessment

System needs assessments involve the application of several professional skills including consultation, intervention design, data analysis and data-driven decision making. This artifact will demonstrate how a system-level consultation approach can identify systemic needs and be leveraged to guide data-driven decision-making to improve student outcomes at the district, school or grade level. A needs assessment can be used to identify areas of growth or gaps in a school/district/system including: academic achievement, mental health, behavioral supports, socioemotional learning, school climate, or staff professional development needs. The need addressed should impact MLs in the school system directly or indirectly, and discuss issues of inequity, barriers to learning and how to create broader access for ML students. This artifact will describe the consultation, data collection and analysis, intervention planning, impact evaluation, and follow-up planning.

Counseling Case Conceptualization

School psychologists are trained to provide mental health support in the form of individual and group counseling in the school setting. Bilingual school psychologists are uniquely able to conceptualize a case for a ML student and to design and provide meaningful, data-driven, evidence-based intervention. This artifact will demonstrate the ability to integrate relevant background information, data collected from school and home sources, presenting concerns, and diagnostic impressions in an effort to design a culturally and linguistically appropriate mental health intervention. While no one theoretical orientation must be used, consideration to the client’s cultural and linguistic background must be centered in treatment design, implementation and evaluation. Discussions of expected or unexpected issues of diversity, power, privilege and intersectionality should be included as appropriate.

Intervention Plan & Implementation

Designing effective, data-driven and evidence-based interventions that are responsive to MLs is a critical skill for bilingual school psychologists. This artifact will capture the development of a tailored intervention for a ML student or group of students (one intervention for a small group with very similar goals). The intervention can support growth in any area of academics, behavior, or social-emotional learning, but must consider the intersectionality of ML students participating in it to ensure appropriateness. Intervention design will be grounded in research-based practices to support ML specifically, while considering possible inequities in the form of systemic barriers, access to services, and lack of understanding of heritage language and culture. Data collected during the intervention will be analyzed to determine intervention efficacy. While the school psychologist does not need to be the interventionist, there should be in close collaboration to ensure the intervention is implemented with fidelity and that progress monitoring and data analysis is completed to plan.

Professional Developement Presentation

School psychologists are uniquely qualified to support systemic change by providing high-quality, evidence-based professional development to school and district staff, families and community stakeholders. This presentation will be based on a relevant topic to the site and stakeholders that you become expert in to provide education and development of current understanding and skills. You will provide best-practices as are relevant to your topic and stakeholders and highlight the research base for your recommendations. This presentation may be delivered in Spanish or English, but either way it will meet the target stakeholders at their level of understanding of the topic and the US educational system. A strength-based approach to multilingualism is articulated throughout as is an effort to highlight issues of inequity due to linguistic and cultural factors. It is recommended that presentations are 30-45 minutes in length (minimum), but more importantly that they meet the needs of the audience.

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