State of Student Voice Practices in Schools Survey
The State of Student Voice Practices in Schools Survey Guide provides your school or district with actionable insights on student voice practices.
Why Measure Student Voice Practices?
Student voice practices (SVPs) can be defined as the strategies and structures that enable students to have an influence on the educational decision-making that impacts their own and their peers’ experiences in school.
Extensive research shows that students who engage in SVPs experience academic gains and positive social-emotional outcomes. One mechanism for centering SVPs in a school’s improvement efforts is to measure how students experience SVPs in their classrooms and schools.
However, figuring out how best to measure SVPs remains a challenge. We are here to help. Our State of Student Voice Practices in Schools Survey Guide is a survey designed to collect valid and reliable data on how your school supports students in shaping and influencing educational decisions so that all students can excel.
Resources
State of Student Voice Practices in Schools Survey
Resource Audience
How Did We Develop the Survey?
The State of Student Voice Practices in Schools Survey was developed in collaboration with the following: Dr. Dana Mitra of Pennsylvania State University, Dr. Jerusha Conner of Villanova University, and Dr. Samantha Holquist of Child Trends.
This team of researchers followed a rigorous measurement development process to ensure measures are valid and reliable, which included a large pilot effort of the survey with five school partners across two different school districts. For more information about the validity and reliability of these measures, please reach out to research@search-institute.org.
What Does the Survey Measure?
The survey includes a suite of measures or sets of questions that assess different components of student voice practices at the school level and at the classroom level. These measures are organized into two sections:
- School-level student voice practices. Includes measures that assess both educator and student perspectives on students’ access to and participation in opportunities to influence educational decisions and school leaders responsiveness to students' improvement ideas.
- Classroom-level student voice practices. Includes measures that assess both educator and student perspectives on whether teachers collaborate with students in decision-making, ask for student input, and are responsive to students’ feedback.
Want Support in Implementing the Survey?
The State of Student Voice Practices in Schools Survey Guide provides the full suite of SVPs measures available, and these measures are designed to be self-explanatory for educators and students. As such, these measures can be integrated into your data collection tools, and administered individually like any other self-report questionnaire or rating scale.
We also offer a Student Voice Survey Module as a part of our Developmental Relationships Survey offerings. Through this customizable survey, you’ll receive survey administration support, online access to the survey, and an interactive data dashboard featuring real-time results.
Learn More About Our Survey Services.
The content on this page and all resources associated with The State of Student Voice Practices in Schools Survey Guide were created by Jerusha Conner, Samantha Holquist, and Dana Mitra with technical and editorial assistance from Search Institute staff. Suggested Citation: Conner, J., Holquist, S., Mitra, D., & Search Institute. (2023). State of Student Voices in Schools Survey. Minneapolis, MN: Search Institute.