Solution-Focused Brief Therapy Groupwork with At-Risk Junior High School Students: Enhancing the Bottom Line

Abstract

Despite the preliminary studies that support solution-focused brief therapy, limited research has examined the model as a group intervention with students at risk for academic underachievement and school nonattendance. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to evaluate the impact of the model on school attendance and grade point average. Solution-focused brief therapy was evaluated through a quasi-experimental pretest-posttest comparison group design in which 26 students receiving the intervention were compared to 26 students who did not. Compared to students who did not receive the intervention, students in the treatment group increased their grade point average from pretreatment to posttreatment. Conversely, no differences were found between the two groups on attendance. Solution-focused brief therapy shows promise as a group intervention with at-risk students. Moreover, the findings suggest the continued support of the model during a time in which K-12 education emphasizes accountability, hard data, and the bottom line.

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