Annenberg Institute School Improvement
Tools
The Annenberg Institute web site includes tools and step-by-step guides to help users examine specific school-improvement concerns. Tools include observation protocols, focus group samples and questions, surveys, and questionnaires. They are organized by key focus areas: leadership; community connections; professional development; school organization; school climate; student supports; and comprehensive school improvement.
California Healthy Kids Survey
The Healthy Kids Survey is a grades 5-12 comprehensive and customizable youth self-report data collection system that provides essential and reliable health risk assessment and resilience information to schools, districts, and communities. The student self-report Youth Development and Resiliency module includes questions related to school climate and connectedness. There is also a staff school climate survey that measures "staff perceptions of student behavior and attitudes, school programs and policies, and the overall school climate as they relate to student well-being and learning." The surveys are also available in Spanish.
Chicago Public Schools Student Connection Survey
The Chicago Public Schools (CPS) office has produced a survey that measures student perceptions of safety, educational expectations, school support, social and emotional skills, and extracurricular participation. CPS is the first large urban district to systematically measure this information.
The Comprehensive School Climate Inventory (CSCI)
CSEE has developed an online data driven tool called the Comprehensive School Climate Inventory (CSCI) to help schools measure, understand and improve school climate. The CSCI can be used to conduct school-wide needs assessments, initiate and sustain a community-wide school improvement process and to evaluate the success of systemic and pedagogic interventions as a pre - and post - measure. This inventory is fee-based (fees vary based on the number of students in the school), with additional fees for optional services.
Developmental Studies Center Child Development Project
Scales
These scales, developed and validated for over 20 years, measure students’ social, emotional, ethical, and academic development, as well as student involvement in high-risk behaviors. The scales also measure aspects of school climate, including student perceptions of the school community, student-teacher relationships, and liking of school.
High School Survey of Student Engagement
The ultimate goal of HSSSE is to document, describe, and monitor student engagement in educationally purposeful activities in secondary schools nationally. HSSSE provides information that can be used to stimulate discussions on teaching and learning and guide student improvement activities. Participation in the survey requires a school fee, and per/student costs.
National Center for Injury Prevention and Control: Measuring
Violence Compendium
This compendium contains more than 170 measures, and provides researchers and prevention specialists with a set of tools to assess violence-related beliefs, behaviors, and influences, as well as to evaluate programs to prevent youth violence. Most of the measures in this compendium are intended for use with youths between the ages of 11 and 24 years. The last section of the compendium focuses on measures of school climate (e.g., commitment and attitudes toward school, prosocial involvement, and classroom climate).
School as a Caring Community Profile--II
This profile is a 43-question survey for the “4th and 5th
Rs.” The first 26 items relate to perceptions of students;
the final 17 items relate to perceptions of adults.
World Health Organization's Psycho-Social Environment Profile
WHO has created an extensive school social-emotional climate survey that is easy to administer, fill out, and score. In addition to the survey instrument, it includes a short background section that summarizes research demonstrating the benefits schools gain from attending to climate issues, gives suggestions on how the survey should be administered, specifies how the data can be used to improve school climate, and includes worksheets for leading discussions on each of the seven areas of climate assessed.
What Kids Can Do: Students As Allies in Improving Their Schools, Sample Surveys
The surveys were originally designed and administered by SAA student-teacher research teams (at 20 high schools across five cities) and included a common core of questions, along with questions students had developed specifically for classmates at their school. The common core addressed areas such as: school climate, student-teacher relationships, teaching styles, academic expectations, safety and discipline, student voice, and improving student learning.
Wisconsin School Climate Survey
The Wisconsin Successful Schools initiative has posted student and staff school climate surveys on its website as part of its school improvement project. In addition to the climate surveys, be sure to look at the "characteristics of successful schools" surveys. They include surveys on school vision, leadership, school family partnerships, and SEL-related standards. | 
