Evidence shows that the school can contribute to deviant or delinquent behavior or it can promote positive and law-abiding behaviors. Schools must organize themselves and their programs to prevent drop-outs and to serve the needs of behaviorally disordered youth. While early intervention programs are crucial, long-term intervention for the school-related problems of delinquents is also important. The authors review several school-based behavioral programs and point out that they share the following characteristics: (1) the programs serve primarily junior high school students, (2) student participants are selected for the programs because of serious school discipline problems, (3) the majority of the participants have not been adjudicated delinquent before participating in the program, (4) behavioral intervention is used to improve academic achievement and school attendance and to decrease negative behavior, (5) at least part of each participant's day is spent in regular classroom settings (mainstream), and (6) the program includes a behavioral family intervention component. These programs have not been able to prevent delinquency as much as would have been hoped. In part, this failure may reflect the programs' inability to positively affect the maintenance of academic skills over time. Continuing behavioral intervention programs into high school may increase long-term academic skill building. In addition, intervention should begin in preschool or elementary school rather than in junior high school. 98 references.