Sep 29, 2026 · 14 min · 12 segments
This episode explores what happens to MTSS buy-in once the energy of launch wears off. Larissa looks at why buy-in fades in year two, including leadership turnover, competing initiatives, and teachers…
Michael Folan, who has studied school change for decades, calls it the implementation dip.
When people try something that asks for new skills and new ways of thinking, performance and confidence usually go down before they go up.
The problem is that the dip tends to land right when the excitement of launch runs out.
They aren't seeing results yet and they start to wonder if it was worth it.
and asked what helped them sustain implementation and what staff buy-in came out on top of both lists.
When the MTSS meeting becomes a place to fill out forms instead of solve problems for kids, people stop seeing the point.
And number four, teachers who give or supply data never see what happens to it.
They screen, they enter scores, they fill out a referral, and then nothing comes back.
Thomas Guske wrote a piece for Education Week that explains why that last one hurts so much.
His argument is that teachers' beliefs usually change after they see results with their own students.
Michael Folan, who has studied school change for decades, calls it the implementation dip.
When people try something that asks for new skills and new ways of thinking, performance and confidence usually go down before they go up.
The problem is that the dip tends to land right when the excitement of launch runs out.
They aren't seeing results yet and they start to wonder if it was worth it.
and asked what helped them sustain implementation and what staff buy-in came out on top of both lists.
When the MTSS meeting becomes a place to fill out forms instead of solve problems for kids, people stop seeing the point.
And number four, teachers who give or supply data never see what happens to it.
They screen, they enter scores, they fill out a referral, and then nothing comes back.
Thomas Guske wrote a piece for Education Week that explains why that last one hurts so much.
His argument is that teachers' beliefs usually change after they see results with their own students.
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