Refinement and Further Development of the Washington Assessment of Risk and Needs of Students

This measurement project, led by Dr. Strand at WSU Tri-Cities and Drs. French, Gotch, and Poppen at WSU Pullman aim to refine and further develop the Washington Assessment of the Risks and Needs of Students (WARNS). School truancy is a nationwide problem in the US that contributes to school failure and dropout, negative mental and physical health outcomes, social maladjustment, and lower levels of occupational and economic attainment. The WARNS is an assessment that validly and reliably assesses factors related to school truancy. More than 80 school districts in Washington use the WARNS as a point of entry into self-reflection and solution-focused conversations between counselors and students. Dr. Roduta Roberts and Dr. Gotch are developing and exploring the use of narratives or vignettes as an adjunct to traditional score reports from the WARNS. While current reports help identify heightened areas of risk and need, they present an atomized view of the student. Vignettes reassemble students ’responses to the WARNS into a coherent picture of how profiles of risk and need manifest in everyday settings. The intent is for counselors and students to explore vignette content that resonates with students’ lived experiences, thereby supporting more effective intervention planning. Study funded by the Institute of Educational Sciences (IES), US Department of Education