Leadership is key to successful implementation of any large-scale innovation. The building principal, assistant principal(s), and school leadership team are critical to implementing MTSS at the school level. They engage staff in ongoing professional development for implementing MTSS, plan strategically for MTSS implementation, and model a problem-solving process for school improvement. The school principal also supports the implementation of MTSS by communicating a vision and mission to school staff, providing resources for planning and implementing instruction and intervention, and ensuring that staff have the data needed for data-based problem-solving.

(North Carolina’s MTSS Critical Components, July 2019)

MTSS School Leadership Guiding Questions

The School Leadership Meeting is designed to help MTSS leadership teams ask, reflect on, and leverage data to problem-solve the answers to these six system-level questions:

1. Is the core curriculum supporting 80% of students (i.e., are 80% of students on grade level)? If not, take a deeper dive into the schools, grade levels, content areas, and classrooms to evaluate the quality of the intended curriculum, the resources, and delivery of instruction.

2. Is the core curriculum supporting students equitably, across demographics, schools, grades, and classrooms? If the answer is no, take a deeper dive into the schools and grade levels to evaluate the cultural responsiveness of the core.

3. Are students progressing and do we see healthy tier movement? With healthy support at each tier, more students should be moving down in tiered support intensity than up. If not (i.e., there is greater movement up than down), take a closer look into the schools, grades, and tier levels to evaluate the quality of the interventions provided.

4. Are students progressing equitably? If not, evaluate the demographic breakdown of students being supported at the tier 2 and 3 level as well as the quality of interventions to identify any disproportionality or biases in how students are being supported.

5. Are evidence-based interventions being delivered with fidelity? If not, drill down to schools, grades, and topic levels to see if there are particular areas of concern, potentially with particular interventions. Determine whether educators need additional support implementing certain programs or practices.

6. Are efficiencies being found through creating small groups for intervention work? If not, how can we use current assessment data to form specific "skill-based" small groups to lessen the number of plans to be written, student support meetings to hold, and more kids served with the same amount of time?

Research and best practice in MTSS points to the importance of problem-solving across multiple levels. Systems-level problem-solving is an essential foundation to any MTSS/RTI model and provides the support for teams of educators to come together to meet the needs of individual students.

What Roles & Responsibilities Do MTSS Team Members Hold?

Successful teams clearly articulate everyone’s roles and responsibilities so people are adequately able to prepare for what is expected of them and bring their best to the team. The following are typical roles and responsibilities that should be explicitly assigned to members of the MTSS team, given individual strengths and abilities:

1) Administrative Representative

1. • Provides leadership at MTSS team meetings

   • Facilitates monitoring of instructional integrity within grade levels/departments

   • Ensures progress monitoring for all students in Tiers 2 and 3 (both for students with IEPs and those without IEPs)

   • Ensures school schedule and resource allocation enables a successful MTSS practice

   • Celebrates and communicates success

2) MTSS Team Coordinator/Facilitator

1. • Coordinates and sets agenda for MTSS team meetings

   • Provides expertise to MTSS team regarding problem-solving protocol

   • Provides expertise in data analysis

   • Identifies trends in student/staff need across school

3) Grade-level/Content Area Representative

1. • Serves as a liaison between PLC/grade-level/department team and MTSS team

   • Attends grade level PLC/MTSS meetings on a regular basis

   • Identifies trends in student/staff need across grade-level or content area

   • Presents data/background information on student being discussed (in absence of classroom teacher)

4) Specialists (rotating members including ELL teacher, speech/language pathologist, intervention teacher, behavior specialist)

1. • Provides expertise to MTSS team regarding interventions and skill remediation

   • Supports MTSS team with data interpretation and ensures linkage of data to selected interventions

   • Gathers progress monitoring data from PLCs and Tier 3 interventionists for review during MTSS meetings

   • Consults/collaborates with classroom teachers regarding differentiated instruction

5) Classroom teacher (Rotating member)

1. • Provides experience with and knowledge of student being discussed

   • Presents data/background information on student

   • Ensures next steps are documented and communicated with student and/or family