Collaborating With Parents for Early School Success: The Achieving-Behaving-Caring Program

The Achieving-Behaving-Caring (ABC) Program is an evidence-based approach to addressing the needs of elementary students at risk for emotional and behavioral difficulties and promoting successful home-school collaboration. This practical guide demonstrates how classroom teachers and parents can work together to boost individual children's strengths, reduce problems that interfere with learning, and provide classwide social skills training. The use of trained parent liaisons is a special feature of the program. Detailed, step-by-step instructions for implementing ABC are accompanied by many useful case illustrations and tips. The book includes more than two dozen reproducible handouts and forms, in a convenient large-size format with lay-flat binding.

This book is in The Guilford Practical Intervention in the Schools Series, edited by T. Chris Riley-Tillman.

Stephanie H. McConaughy, PhD, is Research Professor of Psychiatry and Psychology at the University of Vermont and a Vermont-licensed practicing psychologist and nationally certified school psychologist. She collaborated on the research design and outcome evaluation of the Achieving-Behaving-Caring (ABC) research project and was Co-Investigator of the ABC outreach project. She is the author of numerous journal articles, chapters, books, and published instruments on assessment of children’s behavioral, emotional, and learning problems.

Pam Kay, MEd, who passed away in December 2006, was Research Associate in the University of Vermont College of Education and Social Services. Her research focused on prevention programs for children at risk for behavioral and emotional problems and collaborative relationships between parents and teachers. She served as Project Director on the original ABC research project and Principal Investigator of the ABC outreach project. With Bob Algozzine, Ms. Kay was coeditor of Preventing Problem Behaviors: A Handbook of Successful Prevention Strategies. She was also an elementary school teacher and an executive in several community agencies.

Julie A. Welkowitz, PhD, is Associate Professor at Southern New Hampshire University (SNHU) and a licensed clinical psychologist. She currently serves as the Assistant Academic Coordinator of the Graduate Program in Community Mental Health at SNHU. Dr. Welkowitz was previously on the faculty of the University of Vermont, where she was a Co-Investigator on the ABC outreach project. Her research has focused on school- and community-based initiatives to support students with emotional and behavioral disorders.

Kim Hewitt, MEd, joined the ABC research team as a Parent Liaison for children and families who participated in the original ABC research project, and then served as Parent Liaison Consultant/Educator in the ABC outreach project. She was Chairperson of the Advisory Board of the grassroots organization Vermont Parent-to-Parent in the mid-1980s, and has been an active advocate for children and families since that time. Ms. Hewitt received her master’s degree in education from the University of Vermont, and is now pursuing a teaching career emphasizing strength-based and family-centered practices.

Martha D. Fitzgerald, EdD, is Professor Emerita of Education at the University of Vermont. She was Principal Investigator of the original research grant to develop and test the ABC Program model and the grant for ABC outreach efforts. Her research has focused on prevention programs for children at risk for learning, behavioral, and emotional problems; early education services for preschool children with disabilities; and school-based approaches to special education mediated by consulting teachers.