ABSTRACT
The field of school psychology is in the midst of two related shifts. The first is the movement from a medical model that focuses on individual deficits to a public health model that focuses on prevention (Ysseldyke et al., 2006). In addition, the field of school psychology is grappling with conceptualizing its practice within a social justice framework (Speight & Vera, 2009). Conceptualizing service delivery in terms of a public health model and adopting a social justice framework for practice are a natural pairing (Prilleltensky, 2005). A public health model requires an ecological-systems perspective and a social justice framework requires a consideration of how school psychology practice can promote fairness and respect by addressing the school ecology, from the individual to systems (Prilleltensky, 2005; Rogers & O'Bryon, 2008; Shriberg et al., 2008; Speight & Vera, 2009). Both the public health model and a social justice framework focus on promoting well-being as opposed to ameliorating deficits (Prilleltensky, 2005).
