What is PBIS?

make kids smarter.

To foster good study habits,

encourage a love of learning,

and help prepare them for those nasty standardized tests.

But mental intelligence

isn't everything. If it were,

there might be perfectly brilliant scientists

and financial wizards out there

dressing inappropriately to important meetings,

robbing their own loved ones blind,

or doing unsafe things on the roof

of a moving vehicle.

What it comes down to is that

social behavior is every bit as important

as growing those brain cells.

You can rack up a whole wall full of fancy-sounding degrees,

but if you don't know how to conduct yourself

in the real world, you're gonna have a rough time of it.

And that's where PBIS comes in.

First of all, since you're probably dying to know

what that acronym stands for,

here it is: Positive Behavioral Interventions and Support.

Anyway, basically, PBIS is a framework that looks

to work with young learners,

instilling in them from the get-go

the important concepts of respect,

responsibility, reliablity,

safety, tolerance, and so on

so that they grow up to be emotionally and socially

well-rounded individuals

rather than just walking, talking brains on a stick.

Although that'd be kind of cool in a way.

All right, well, the program is preventative,

meaning teachers and admins don't wait for kids

to develop issues before they step in.

It's all about taking raw, unmolded human beings

and giving them the tools to do well in life.

And hopefully to stay out of prison.

PBIS works with administrators, parents, and teachers

to form a community within schools,

a network of concerned adults

who are all on the same page when it comes to

providing for their students' success.

Because PBIS is so involved and hands-on,

each school can tailor its program to its needs,

focusing on the areas they deem most important.

Maybe one school thinks tolerance

is uber important, but safety --

eh, they can take it or leave it.

Well, their students will receive behavioral instruction

when it comes to tolerance,

provided they don't fall off the monkey bars and break a leg first.

That's not good.

Needless to say, Shmoop's totally on board

with all this stuff. We're big believers

in a person's education being a holistic thing.

You can't just take a child,

jam their minds full of facts,

and expect them to have it all together

later in life.

So to that end, we are offering a product that includes

short courses as well as teaching guides.

Students will be able to interface with the courses

while the guides are more like scripted lesson plans

that teachers can utilize in the classroom

to supplement their teaching.

We'll break down all the social, cultural,

and behavioral issues that PBIS focuses on

and drill down until we can't drill down any further

or we get to China. Whichever comes first.

So if a student needs particular help

in certain areas - say they're getting into

fights in the cafeteria or they're having

a hard time wrapping their head around the idea of

backpack ownership,

Shmoop will be there to lend a helping hand.

Or if a school simply wants to take

more preventative action and introduce its students

to all these concepts upfront,

well, that works, too.

As educators, we're thinkers.

But let's not forget that we're all human beings, too,

with complicated emotions, fears,

anxieties, inhibitions,

and backgrounds.

Shmoop and PBIS will uncomplicate them

so that we can all be happy, whole,

and well-balanced.

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