A Comparison of Teacher Nomination and Screening to Identify Behavioral and Emotional Risk Within a Sample of Underrepresented Students

Early identification of behavioral and emotional risk has been identified as one strategy to help decrease rates of childhood behavioral and emotional problems. This study compares two methods for early identification (teacher nomination and universal screening) to determine how each strategy may differentially identify at-risk students. A sample of 849 elementary and middle school students was assessed on a number of behavioral and academic outcomes to determine differences among identification methods. Results indicate that universal screening identified a higher number of students than teacher nomination, and those identified by universal screening had lower reading grades. Both approaches identified more males than females. Although students identified as at risk by both methods had significantly more office discipline referrals, and lower study habits and cooperation grades than students not identified as at risk, there were no significant differences in these variables between the early identification methods. Implications and future research needs are discussed.