Dive Brief:
- More than 60,000 students and 4,000 teachers in about a dozen states took online Quaglia School Voice surveys during the 2015-16 school year, responding to questions about the extent to which teaching and learning environments are characterized by positive relationships, engaged learning and a sense of purpose.
- The 2016 School Voice Report from the Quaglia Institute for School Voice and Aspirations says even though 99% of teachers reported they respect students, only 58% of students feel like teachers do, and while 82% of teachers say they actively seek out student opinions and ideas, only 47% of students agreed teachers were willing to learn from them.
- Other highlights from the report include: 57% of teachers believe meaningful professional development exists in their district, 19% of teachers do not affirm they enjoy working at school and 64% of teachers agree their school is a dynamic and creative learning environment.
Dive Insight:
Now that states are free to create new accountability metrics for schools beyond student performance on standardized tests, tools like the Quaglia school voice surveys can be incorporated into assessment systems. Quaglia has identified eight “conditions that make a difference,” and its surveys center on finding out whether those conditions are present in schools with which it works. The University of Chicago Consortium on School Research has identified five “essentials” that contribute to school success. Its framework, too, relies on surveys to identify whether these five components are in place.
An important element of school improvement is identifying the unique circumstances at a school. Surveys can help get to the heart of what is happening from the perspectives of multiple stakeholder groups.