How Clifford School Laid the Groundwork for PBIS in a Challenging Middle School Year

Lessons from an Imperfect Rollout

Jackson is candid about what did not go well. The implementation lacked sufficient upfront training. Teachers needed dedicated time to sit with the platform, understand the reports and insights available to them, and participate in building the behavior rubric. Instead, the school moved quickly – putting the system in place and expecting people to figure it out as they went.

The consequences were predictable. Without ownership over the expectations and reward criteria, some teachers used LiveSchool consistently while others did not. The gap was visible to students, who quickly noticed which classrooms awarded points and which did not. Teacher buy-in, Jackson recognized, requires teachers to be part of the entire process: defining what students earn points for, deciding what the rewards look like, and understanding what data the system can generate.

The Dolphin Depot – Clifford’s student reward store, run by student council and ASB – suffered from inconsistency as well. If students are going to work toward earning points, they need confidence that they can actually spend them on a reliable schedule. The store was not open frequently or predictably enough, which undermined the motivation loop that makes a point economy work.

Jackson frames these as fixable problems rather than failures. The foundation is in place. Teachers understand what LiveSchool is. Students have interacted with the system. The task for year two is not to introduce something new but to do the existing system properly.

Why She Did Not Give Up

Despite the uneven first year, Jackson never considered abandoning the initiative. Her conviction is rooted in experience: she implemented LiveSchool and PBIS successfully at her previous school, Roy Cloud, where the system ran with high fidelity and strong student engagement. She knows what the platform looks like when it is working.

Her reasoning is practical. Middle school behavior is inherently challenging. Students at that age are navigating social pressures, identity formation, and impulse control all at once. Without a system, every teacher handles behavior independently, creating inconsistency that students exploit. With a system, teachers have a shared tool for communicating expectations, documenting patterns, and providing both positive and corrective feedback.

Jackson also sees the restorative dimension. Clifford is working to move away from purely punitive consequences toward conversations and relationship repair. A behavior platform supports that shift by giving teachers structured data about what is happening, replacing gut-feel discipline with pattern recognition. When a student’s LiveSchool profile shows a recurring issue in a specific context, the conversation becomes targeted rather than general.

Planning the House System

The centerpiece of Jackson’s year-two plan is a house system spanning sixth through eighth grade. She implemented houses at Roy Cloud and saw firsthand how the structure transformed student culture. At that school, houses had names, colors, flags, and trimester competitions. The winning house’s flag flew from the school flagpole. Students were invested.

At Clifford, the house system will serve a specific structural purpose beyond culture-building. Currently, there is significant separation between grade levels. Sixth, seventh, and eighth graders have limited opportunities to interact across grades. The house system will be one of the only settings where students from all three grade levels collaborate, compete, and connect.

The house names have not been chosen yet, but the model is clear: cross-grade teams, regular competitions, and visible tracking of house points through LiveSchool. For middle schoolers, competition is a powerful motivator. Jackson believes the combination of peer identity and inter-house rivalry will drive engagement in a way that individual point accumulation alone cannot.

The timing matters. Incoming sixth graders will experience the house system from day one, establishing it as part of the school’s identity rather than an add-on. Current students who struggled with the less-structured first year will have a clearer framework to engage with.

Cell Phones and the Yonder Experiment

Clifford also implemented Yonder pouches this year, a decision made before Jackson arrived. Students place their phones in a magnetically sealed pouch at the start of the day and cannot access them until dismissal. The system is not foolproof – some students claim they left their phone at home only to be seen with it later – but Jackson reports a meaningful reduction in phone-related disruptions during instruction.

The enforcement requires consistent effort. Some teachers are willing to stand at the door every morning and verify that each phone goes into its pouch. Others are less inclined to police it. That inconsistency mirrors the broader challenge Jackson faces with all of her initiatives: buy-in is uneven, and systems only work when everyone participates.

Jackson sees the phone policy and the behavior system as complementary. Both require teaching and reinforcing expectations repeatedly, both improve when the whole staff commits, and both benefit from a predictable consequence structure. As with LiveSchool, she expects year two to be significantly smoother than year one, with incoming students encountering both systems as established norms rather than new rules.

Building on Momentum

Jackson’s reflection captures a reality that every school leader navigating change will recognize: the first year of any initiative is messy. The goal is not perfection. The goal is getting enough of the system in place that the second year can focus on refinement instead of introduction.

Her plan for year two is specific. Dedicate training time at the start of the year so teachers understand the platform fully. Involve teachers in co-creating the behavior rubric and reward menu. Make the Dolphin Depot consistent – open every other Friday without exception. Roll out parent invitations at back-to-school night so families are connected from day one. Launch the house system as the centerpiece of school identity.

The advantage Jackson carries into next year is that the change management is largely done. Teachers have used LiveSchool. Students know what points are. Parents have been introduced to the platform, even if adoption is not yet where Jackson wants it. The foundation exists. What it needs now is fidelity.

For Jackson, the lesson is one she wants other administrators to hear: sticking with an initiative long enough for everyone to see its benefits is the hardest and most important part of the job. Culture change at a school is not a sprint. It is the slow, deliberate work of getting every stakeholder to believe the system is worth their investment.