A common question NaBITA receives is how to address student behavior reports that are made after the weekly BIT/CARE meeting. The question here, when more deeply explored, can be broken down into:
- We can’t wait on a serious report that comes in until the next meeting, right? So, do we call the team together? Do we have an emergency meeting?
- We wouldn’t call the entire team back for a minor issue, correct? How do we figure that out? What are some cases where we would and wouldn’t call an emergency meeting?
- Should a few team member’s meet and decide the risk level and interventions? Then we bring the whole team together during the scheduled time?
These concerns are valid. We don’t want the BIT/CARE teams recalled anytime there is a minor issue. We also don’t want to avoid calling the team together if there is a major case that requires an immediate response. The way we would like to answer these questions is suggesting a shift from holding an “emergency” meeting to holding a “rapid response” meeting. We think this term better describes the way teams should think about these issues.
Before talking about the rapid response meeting itself, let’s discuss cases that should not result in the team coming back together. With few exceptions, we would suggest any case that is mild or moderate would not commonly trigger a rapid response BIT meeting. These cases should be triaged with the NaBITa Risk Rubric by the team chair (or another team member designated by the chair) and actions should be taken to move forward with interventions based on the preliminary assessment of risk.
The exceptions for cases that occur at the mild or moderate level would be ones that involve multiple departments, have a larger political or optic risk to the university or, stated more simply, have a higher likelihood of escalating quickly to elevated or critical on the rubric without a timely intervention. It is useful to think about the purpose of a rapid response meeting, namely, bringing together different departments quickly to address a complicated issue from a variety of perspectives. This multifaceted, collaborative assessment then leads to a more accurate plan of action and intervention. Elevated and critical cases will more commonly trigger a rapid response BIT/CARE meeting. In part two of this tip of the week, we will more clearly define the rapid response meeting, what kind of cases should trigger this meeting, and discuss the prospective outcomes.