Functional Behaviour Assessment in Saskatchewan Schools

When a child's behaviour is significantly disrupting their learning — or the school is calling you to pick them up early — a Functional Behaviour Assessment (FBA) is the evidence-gathering process that should precede any serious intervention plan. In Saskatchewan, FBAs are part of the school-based assessment toolkit, but parents are often left out of the loop about when one is happening, what it's actually measuring, and how the results connect to the Inclusion and Intervention Plan (IIP).

Here's what an FBA is in the Saskatchewan context, and how to use it effectively as a parent.

What a Functional Behaviour Assessment Is

An FBA is a structured process to identify the function — the underlying purpose — of a specific behaviour. The core question it answers is: why is this behaviour happening, and what need is it serving for the student?

Problem behaviours typically serve one of a handful of functions:

• Escape/avoidance: The behaviour lets the student avoid a difficult task, situation, or sensory experience
• Access: The behaviour gets the student something they want — attention, a preferred item, social interaction
• Sensory regulation: The behaviour provides sensory input the student needs
• Communication: The behaviour is the student's way of expressing something they can't articulate verbally

Without knowing the function, interventions often fail or backfire. A child who flips a desk to escape a task they find overwhelming will not be helped by a reward chart that gives them stickers for desk-sitting. The motivation is wrong.

Who Conducts FBAs in Saskatchewan

In Saskatchewan, Functional Behaviour Assessments are typically conducted by:

• Behaviour consultants employed by the school division or contracted regionally
• Educational Psychologists (registered psychologists employed by the division)
• Trained school-based teams for less intensive situations

For students with intensive needs, the FBA is part of the formal assessment process managed by the division's Student Support Services or Intensive Support teams. In Regina Public Schools, for example, this falls under their Intensive Support Consultation Services. Saskatoon Public Schools and other major divisions have dedicated behaviour support specialists.

In rural and northern divisions, this is where the geographic gap becomes critical. Behaviour consultants often serve multiple schools across vast territories on an itinerant basis, visiting specific schools only a few times per month. A student in a rural division experiencing a behavioural crisis may wait considerably longer for a formal FBA than a student in Saskatoon or Regina.

What the FBA Process Looks Like

A thorough FBA involves several components:

1. Direct observation. The consultant observes the student in the settings where the behaviour occurs — classroom, hallways, transitions, lunchroom. They track antecedents (what happens immediately before the behaviour), the behaviour itself, and consequences (what happens after).

2. Interviews. The consultant interviews the classroom teacher, EA, and ideally the parents. Your observations about behaviour patterns at home, during homework, or around transitions are relevant and should be included.

3. Record review. Attendance records, incident reports, prior assessments, and the existing IIP (if there is one) all feed into the FBA.

4. Hypothesis development. From the data, the team develops a hypothesis about the function of the behaviour.

5. Behaviour Support Plan. The FBA findings feed directly into a Behaviour Support Plan (BSP), which outlines proactive strategies to prevent the behaviour, replacement behaviours to teach, and consequences that address the function rather than suppress the behaviour superficially.

How This Connects to the IIP

The Behaviour Support Plan developed from an FBA should be incorporated directly into the student's IIP. The IIP is the governing document — anything that isn't in the IIP has no formal accountability structure behind it.

When reviewing your child's IIP, check whether:

• The behaviour goals are specific and measurable ("will use the break card to request a sensory break at least 3 out of 5 opportunities" — not "will improve self-regulation")
• The strategies are clearly linked to the function identified in the FBA
• The responsibilities are assigned — which staff member is implementing which strategy, and at what frequency
• Data collection is specified — how will progress be measured and how often

If the school says your child needs more behaviour support but there's no FBA and no documented Behaviour Support Plan in the IIP, that's a gap worth pushing on. Informal verbal commitments from kind classroom teachers disappear when teachers change. The IIP is what transfers.

What Parents Can Request

As a parent, you can formally request that an FBA be initiated. Put this in writing to the school principal and the Student Support Services coordinator at the division level. Specify the behaviours you're concerned about and how they're affecting your child's education.

You should also ask to be interviewed as part of the FBA process. Your observations about what triggers the behaviour, what helps, what makes it worse, and what the behaviour looks like at home provide context that classroom observation alone cannot capture.

Once the FBA is complete, ask for a copy of the written report and the resulting Behaviour Support Plan. These documents belong to your child's file and you have the right to access them under the Local Authority Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act (LA FOIP).

The Exclusion Connection

In Saskatchewan, an estimated 1,250 to 1,350 students with intensive needs were excluded from full-time school attendance during the 2024–2025 school year — roughly one in nine students with intensive support needs. Many of these exclusions are triggered by behaviour the school feels it cannot safely manage.

If your child is being sent home due to behaviour, a proper FBA is not optional — it is the foundational step toward actually solving the problem. Schools that reduce a child's hours without conducting an FBA and developing a documented behaviour support plan are managing their staffing problems at the expense of your child's right to education.

When a school cites safety or resource limitations to justify reduced attendance, ask in writing:

• Has a Functional Behaviour Assessment been completed?
• Is there a documented Behaviour Support Plan in the IIP?
• What specific staffing or resources does the school claim are needed, and what steps is the division taking to secure them?

These questions force the school to move from vague justifications to specific, documentable claims — which creates the foundation for escalation if necessary.

Saskatchewan vs. Other Jurisdictions

American parents searching for "behavior intervention plan template" are working within the IDEA framework, which has specific legal requirements for when an FBA must be conducted (for instance, when considering a disciplinary placement change). Saskatchewan has no direct equivalent statutory trigger.

In Alberta, FBAs are similarly used informally within IPP planning. Ontario's IEP process includes behaviour sections, but doesn't mandate FBAs with the same legal structure as the U.S.

Saskatchewan's approach is school-division-driven and quite variable. Some divisions have robust behaviour support teams; others have significant gaps. Knowing your rights to request an FBA, to be part of the process, and to have the findings documented in the IIP is your primary tool.

The Saskatchewan IEP & Support Plan Blueprint includes specific guidance on what behaviour supports to request in the IIP, how to frame requests using the needs-based model, and how to escalate when schools use behaviour as a reason to exclude rather than a problem to solve.

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