The mission of the IISP is promote collaborative scholarship and teaching on issues of regional and global importance in school psychology. The goals of its scholarly initiatives are to initiate, support, and in other ways facilitate scholarship that enhances our understanding of issues important to school psychology as well as to initiate and integrate the results of regional and international studies into informed and coherent perspectives on issues important to school psychology.

The goal of its teaching initiatives is to promote the interchange of information among those engaged in applied practice, scholarship, and public policy in ways that enhance links between practice, scholarship, and public policy. IISP will rely heavily on the use of the world wide web to facilitate this interchange.

The work of the IISP is intended to be cross-disciplinary, given the belief that the combined efforts of persons affiliated with other professions and disciplines, those engaged in other specialties within psychology, as well as school psychologists are needed to better understand the complex historic, cultural, institutional, and interpersonal dimensions that impact children as well as their parents, teachers, and others engaged in promoting healthy child growth and development.

The administrative structure of the Institute relies on international affiliates from all countries in which school psychology is practiced. IISP's executive committee consists of a smaller number of international affiliates who accepted an invitation to assist more directly in its management. Shane Jimerson and Thomas Oakland serve as the Institute's co-directors.