Increasingly, researchers and practitioners are turning attention to the powerful influence of the social environment on adolescents’ health behaviors. Schools are a natural place to focus social environmental programs and research; however, measurement of school environments is challenging. School health indices have been developed with respect to particular behaviors, e.g. physical activity; tobacco use; healthy eating. However, few attempt to assess the overall school environment quality or functioning. There is growing evidence that overall neighborhood characteristics (e.g., income inequality; social capital; collective efficacy) affect health, and it is likely that overall school characteristics also play an important role in shaping health-related psychosocial and behavioral characteristics of youth. While overall school climate measures exist, most focus on individual students’ and staff members’ perceptions, and the intraschool correlations are generally low (often around 0.025), suggesting that they provide more information about individuals than institutional characteristics. This presentation will focus on attempts to characterize schools’ institutional characteristics by developing a School Functioning Index (SFI) for middle and junior high schools. School-level data were obtained from public archives and principal surveys. Group-level variables used to create the SFI included: attendance; student and staff mobility and retention; proportion passing state-mandated basic standards tests; socioeconomic measures; and school size (SFI alpha=0.88). Strengths and limitations of the SFI will be discussed, as will challenges in data collection. The SFI may be a promising first step in measuring school environments, and may be useful for multilevel research and program planning.
Learning Objectives: At the conclusion of the session, the participant (learner) in this session will be able to: (1) discuss the concepts of the overall school environment and school functioning; (2) list at least five potential indicators of overall school functioning; (3) describe two potential applications of a school functioning index in school-based health program planning and multilevel health behavior research.
Keywords: School Health, Health Indices
Presenting author's disclosure statement:
Organization/institution whose products or services will be discussed: None
I do not have any significant financial interest/arrangement or affiliation with any organization/institution whose products or services are being discussed in this session.