Table 6:

Protocol deviations

Category	Event	Severity	Corrective action
Group	Students note that no one in the group gets along. Interactions between group members continue to cause issues causing disciplinary action from the classroom teacher.	High	The group members remained the same to maintain fidelity of the intervention. The group was more closely monitored in subsequent days and study team members or school staff intervened if necessary.
	3 students dropped out of being peer leaders with no explanation. One student dropped out due to anxiety.	Low	Groups were formed with a back-up leader to prevent issues if peer leaders decided not to administer the intervention.
	A student was not assigned to any group despite completing the network survey.	Low	The student was randomly assigned to a group and their responses were excluded from the final analysis.
Schedule	Training Day 1 was modified to a block schedule resulting in a shorter period.	Medium	Teachers were able to slightly modify the block schedule to ensure there was enough time for the students to be trained.
	The celebration party was rescheduled multiple times due to close proximity to the holidays. Due to this, no study team member could be present.	Low	Study team members submitted a statement to the classroom teacher for them to read thanking the students.
	There were multiple reschedules due to schoo! events (dodgeball tournament and dance recital).	Low	The study team was able to reschedule the sessions and consulted the school events calendar when doing so.
	There was a fire drill that cut into class time.	Low	Discussion time was cut down to ensure that there was enough time to complete all activities.
Logistical	A school randomized to be peer-led incorrectly began 1 class with expert-led instruction.	High	Students in the incorrect class completed as expert-led. Additional classes in the school were correctly taught as peer-led.
	The network survey proved too difficult for students to complete in the first version. The students were unable to retake it resulting in a loss of baseline data for the first group.	High	The issues were specifically based on the layout (rather than reading level) and the formatting was quickly adjusted.
	Students had opted out of participating in the study but school staff called home to explain the study to parents and ask them to allow their children to participate.	Medium	No corrective action was taken since the actions were outside of the scope of the study team.
	Students were excluded in the network analysis because they were absent on the day of the network survey.	Medium	A study team member administered the intervention to the students and their responses were excluded from the final dataset.
	Students were taking the survey on their Chromebooks. One Chromebook would not work.	Low	The teacher allowed the student to take the survey on his computer. Steps were taken to ensure that the Chromebooks were working prior to starting the survey in subsequent rounds.
	A technical error occurred with creation of Roster IDs in Excel causing duplicates.	High	A study team member wrote student names and new roster IDs on the chalkboard for the students to use. In subsequent rounds, the Roster ID assignments were checked by at least two members of the study team.
	On intervention day, a teacher was absent without a substitute. The 4 classes needed to be divided into 3.	Low	The teachers worked with study team member to ensure that classes were divided to keep group members within the same class section.