Why do we have the Pre-Referral Process?
Part of the school psychologist’s role is to help school support teams prioritize the students who they feel most urgently need a psych-ed assessment. It is a necessary process because the number of requests for assessments usually far exceeds the number of assessments a school psychologist is able to do during a school year. Sometimes a full psych-ed assessment isn’t necessary at the time because there are supports available within the school that could help the student with the concern, or it may not be advised until some other things are done first. Best practice suggests that by the time a student’s case might be considered for a possible assessment, the parents/guardians are well-aware that the student is experiencing some sort of challenge within the classroom, and that some help has been provided to the student that may not be working as well as expected.
Usually requests for a psych-ed come from someone within a school, such as the classroom or support teacher. Sometimes they are first requested by parents/guardians, a doctor or pediatrician, another school district specialist, or others. ALL requests for psych-eds, regardless of who initiated the request, need to go through the same process through the school-based team and then onto the pre-referral list.
What happens at the Pre-Referral Meeting: What do I need to do?
At the pre-referral meeting the school psychologist will ask a lot of questions. It may seem annoying, but it is an important part of trying to help determine whether the school can try some more things before considering a psych-ed, or some things (such as checking vision or hearing or addressing serious attention or anxiety issues) should be done first to rule out medical issues, or it may be suggested that the student might be better assessed elsewhere. There are also cases where sometimes only a portion of a psych-ed may be needed, such as a behavior measure.
If the school psychologist agrees that a full or partial psych-ed is recommended, the parent/guardian written informed consent must be obtained before we can directly work with the student or administer any standardized learning or behavior measures.
Here are some of the things discussed in the pre-referral meeting and what should be available for the school psychologist to review or to be answered:
- Student File: Includes previous report cards, attendance records, descriptions of support services that the student has received, information such as home language, medical conditions or alerts, pertinent family information. If the student is an English Language Learner, what is their language level and how long have they been receiving service?
- Description of current academic concerns: Any standardized academic testing (eg., KTEA-brief) or other assessment information (eg. Benchmarks) information, work-samples comparing the student’s work in area of concern to “average” student in the class, other samples of work demonstrating areas of concern. What are the student’s strengths? Does the child seem to work hard but not make progress as expected?
- Questions/Discussion: What academic interventions have been tried? Were they successful? Is the student making progress? Do you think the results of the psych-ed will change the types or level of supports that you already offer?
- Social Emotional or Behavior Concerns: Does the student seem happy or unhappy, have friends, have difficulty staying still or paying attention, complain a lot about not feeling well etc.?
- Other: Has hearing and vision been recently checked, any unusual circumstance or upset in the child’s family recently? Does the child seem healthy?