“Assessing School Citizenship Education Climate: Implications for the Social Studies”

Gary Homana, Carolyn Barber and Judith Torney-Purta

This CIRCLE Working Paper (#49) explains the School Citizenship Education Climate Assessment . The tool was designed to be used by teachers and school administrators, mainly at the middle- and upper-grade levels. Future work includes an assessment to be used by students.

According to the lead author, Gary Homana, “Among other things, we wanted to create a self-assessment tool to help members of the school community focus on the relevant characteristics of a positive school and classroom climate in order to better promote good citizenship education. Looking at the bigger picture, we also wanted to develop a tool to help school administrators create workable strategies to increase and sustain policies and practices that enhance students' knowledge, skills and dispositions relating to competent citizenship.”

The researchers explain that the School Citizenship Education Climate Assessment was derived from a variety of research fields including civic education, educational psychology and service-learning. Based on the literature, the authors created a theoretical framework for the assessment consisting of seven characteristics of school climate that they believe are critical to civic education (see the text box below, for a list of the seven characteristics). The assessment contains questions relating to each of the seven characteristics. For example, a question about characteristic #7 (Engagement in and Learning about the Community) is as follows:

The statements that follow relate to your school's support forservice-learning.

(Answer Choices: Strongly Disagree, Disagree,Agree Strongly, Agree, I Don't Know/ Does Not Apply)

1) This school formally recognizes service-learning as part of its mission and/or vision.

2) This school has written policies designed to support service-learning.

3) Service-learning is incorporated into the school's curriculum guidelines.

4) Service-learning at this school is linked to content standards.

In addition to the assessment tool, and the CIRCLE Working Paper, the authors provide a short narrative report explaining how to use the assessment tool and potential users (both the assessment tool and accompanying narrative report can be found at http://www.ecs.org/qna). Homana states, “We tried to make the assessment tool as userfriendly as possible. We provide instructions on how to properly use the assessment, including a description of how to compute composite scale scores, recommendations of who should complete the survey, and suggestions for using assessment results. To this end, we developed four four key categories that explore how the School Citizenship Climate Assessment can encourage meaningful learning; enhance social-emotional growth; examine school policies and structures; and promote active learning opportunities both in and outside of the school all within the framework of citizenship education.”

The CIRCLE Working Paper #49 concludes with suggestions for future research and can be downloaded from http://www.civicyouth.org.

SEVEN KEY CHARACTERISTICS OF CITIZENSHIP EDUCATION

1. Official recognition and community acceptance of the civic purpose of education that is communicated to all teachers, students and administrators

2. Meaningful learning of civic-related knowledge that builds on and enhances academic and participation skills

3. Cooperation and collaboration in approaching civic related learning and problem-solving

4. Mutual trust and positive interactions among diverse students, faculty and administrators

5. Students' input in planning and skills in participatory problem-solving that is valued

6. Deliberation and dialogue about issues that are thoughtful and respectful

7. Engagement within the school and commitment to learn about and interact with the broader community

Source: CIRCLE Working Paper (#49) “Assessing School Citizenship Education Climate: Implications for the Social Studies”