Review of Literature

Introduction

Teachers are responsible for students success and achievement. A student who passes well in school has a chance of acquiring numerous opportunities in the global market. However, students who fail in school are likely to fall into poverty or be dependent on others. Hence, teachers are tasked with ensuring that the needs of all students are met. Fortunately, there has been lots of evidence to prove that Response to Intervention (RTI) is an approach that can help us give every student academic support required to effectively learn (Burns, Appleton, & Stehouwer, 2005). RTIs fundamental principle is that learning institutions should not wait for students to lag in class for the student to be eligible for special education and offer them the help they need. Instead, learning institutions should offer directed and orderly interventions to all learners as soon as they determine the need.

The theoretical framework of Response to Intervention (RTI) starts at the national level. This literature review will outline RTI at the national, state, and system levels. It will also identify the basis and shows the procedure required at each level. It also has a section that describes the findings of various researchers regarding RTI.

Student Support Team Process before RTI

Before the implementation of RTI, schools applied the Students Support Team process. This process was intended to offer support to the student and teacher through a combined team approach with key stakeholders. SST was created because the collaborative approach works when coming up with plans for students with learning disabilities. SST was a valuable tool because it provided an effective educational program for learners(Barrio & Combes, 2015).

Student Support Teams prove to be more effective in learning institutions whereby the teachers are responsible for all students and can help them in collaborative problem-solving. The process entailed basic steps that focused on individual student needs, ways of learning, program efficiency, and communication. Before and during the first meeting, the team members collect relevant information on the students past and present educational and behavioral performance. The information was mainly from sources such as parents, official school records, and anecdotal records. The team would then meet to discuss, evaluate the information acquired, and decide whether more information is needed. The team would then develop an individual educational plan tailored depending on the students strengths and weaknesses.

Plans and techniques are suggested and supported by all the team members involved in the implementation process. It is at this time that a timeline for a follow-up is established. The developed educational plan is effected for a certain period, and supplementary data is gathered if necessary (Barrio & Combes, 2015); and the team would have regular meetings to discuss student progress and supplementary information that may be presented. In case there is a demand to change the education plan, the alterations will be done during the SST meeting.

Lastly, there is the ongoing monitoring and evaluation that is a significant part of the SST process. If the education plan proved successful and no disability was discovered, the team continued to observe the student progress and decide when to support the classroom plans. However, if a disability were discovered, the team would advise that they go for psychological testing. Upon completing the test, the team will hold another meeting to discuss eligibility for special education (Barrio & Combes, 2015).

Many learning institutions struggle to benefit from RTI because they misguidedly view RTI as just a new method of qualifying learners for special education by directing the efforts to regular education interventions before referring the students who lag in class to traditional special education testing and placement. Other schools are...

…(2008), the implementation and sustenance of an RTI initiative is the schools instructional leaders role. Successful implementation of the RTI process largely depends on the leadership practices. Support from the administration is important for successful implementation. The administrative behavior determines whether an RTI will succeed or fail and increase or decrease the referrals to special education.

However, in research carried out by Rafoth and Foriska (2006), it seems that there is no direct link between administrative support and effective teams.They assert that leadership behaviors do not affect the drive and implementation of RTI; it is the schools principles that determine a successful implementation. Leadership is not in any way linked to RTI, whether positively or negatively.

A case study conducted by Cutler (2009) examines the change process concerning the first-year implementation of RTI in an urban school district.Supporters of RTI identified various advantages of strategic intervention offered by RTI. The advantages include; data is used to make informed decisions, separate disabled students from those who may be weak in particular skill areas, and help quickly address the needs of an underperforming student.

Summary

RTI has become an important part of the school community throughout the nation regardless of whether it was implemented at the national, state, or system level. National guidelines may be different compared to state or county guidelines. However, it is the implementation that determines the effects on individual students. Effective implementtion will result in a positive impact on individual students (McCook, 2007). Numerous researchers have conducted studies to show the significance of RTI in various ways. RTI is a developing section of the decision-making process concerning students. Although the implementation of RTI may vary from one state to another, the impact of RTA on the success rate highly depends on the appropriate interventions offered to students identified as at-risk before being referred…