ESPISE-3P

The research project titled «Establishing Safe, Positive, Inclusive School Environments: The three-tiered paradigm» (ESPISE-3P) presents an innovative approach to the current school discipline practices in Cyprus. The project's overarching goal is to revisit and reshape such discipline punitive-based practices by giving emphasis on creating a safe, positive, and inclusive school environment through a preventative multi-tiered supports system for addressing more efficiently and effectively student academic and behavioral problems.

To achieve this, a transatlantic partnership was built between researchers at University of North Carolina at Charlotte (U.S.A.) and University of Cyprus (Cyprus). The project took place in public elementary schools across countries.

The ESPISE-3P project had a dual research focus:

1. To what extent were content and procedures, student outcomes and family involvement of the ongoing school-wide PBIS approach, as implemented by school personnel at exemplar elementary schools in Cabarrus County Schools (U.S.A.), consistent with recommended evidence-based practices documented in the research literature?

2. What would such an evidence-based PBIS model look like for the elementary schools of Cyprus?