Student Experience Survey: Measuring Belonging, Connection, Engagement
When students feel that they belong…they feel confident that they are seen as a human being, a person of value.
– Floyd Cobb & John Krownapple
INTRO
Let’s move away from an environment where kids are sorted, packaged, and labeled based on the perceptions of adults who barely know them. Readiness and success should be defined by students’ engagement, adaptability, and what they can do with their knowledge. However, students need to feel a sense of belonging, connection, and engagement as well as demonstrate self-awareness, self-management, and well-being to achieve true readiness and success. This survey process is an important step in that direction.
OBJECTIVES
- Inform intentional classroom and school-level action by elevating student voice in terms of needs and experience
- Root cause analysis (with a twist)
- Identify what works for students so you can replicate the necessary conditions
What the Student Experience Survey Assesses and Why
BELONGING
Students who feel a sense of belonging feel respected, accepted, and supported by teachers and peers.
CONNECTION
Students who are connected believe adults and peers in the school care about their learning as well as them as individuals.
ENGAGEMENT
Students who are engaged clearly demonstrate levels of interest, enthusiasm, and involvement they have for their learning.
SELF-AWARENESS
The ability to know one’s own strengths and limitations, with a well-grounded sense of confidence, optimism, and a growth mindset.
SELF-MANAGEMENT
The capacity to delay gratification, manage stress, and feel motivation and agency to accomplish personal and collective goals.
WELL-BEING
Based on student responses to questions about (1) how often they have felt happy, optimistic, and hopeful; and (2) how often they have felt lonely, afraid, and worried over the past week.
For Your Consideration and Reflection
- Does your school/district share an understanding of what you mean by belonging, connection, and engagement?
- Who is responsible for belonging, connection, and engagement?
- What is the relationship between belonging, connection, and engagement and a positive culture and climate at your site?
- Which of the three was most impacted by the pandemic? What have you done intentionally to address it?
Conduct the Schoolwide Student Experience Survey
Use the survey questions provided, or write your own, to gather feedback from students about their sense of belonging, connection, and engagement.
The provided Google Form, Google Doc, and .pdf (below) resources have the same questions and are the same survey; we are providing different formats to best suit your needs. The Google Form will direct you to create your own copy of the survey that you can then edit to meet your school’s needs.
Provide necessary supports, so each and every student can participate. This could include dual language/translation for ELL students, technology supports, visual aids, definitions, ample classroom/school time for anxiety-free completion, etc.
Use the survey results to inform intentional classroom and school level action by elevating student voice in terms of needs and experience.
Dive deeper into the results through empathy interviews. See this Toolkit post for detailed steps and resources for conducting empathy interviews. Empathy interviews are student-centered intentional conversations focused on positive student experiences. Empathy interviews are intended to discover and set the right conditions for students, and can be conducted with individuals or small groups. Empathy interviews focus on what students see, do, experience, and feel.
Conduct a PIN Analysis (Positive, Interesting, Needs Attention) to evaluate data and unpack insights.
By categorizing responses, you can quickly identify areas of strength (Positives), uncover unique or unexpected findings worth exploring further (Interesting), and pinpoint challenges or concerns requiring attention (Needs Attention). This method not only simplifies complex data but also ensures balanced consideration, empowering you to make data-driven decisions that enhance student experiences and foster meaningful improvements across the school community.
Build and implement an action plan. Look for trends to identify root cause and potential actions.
Identify Little Things, Key Moves, and/or Big Plays. Little Things are smaller efforts you can do tomorrow, or within the next week or so. Key Moves are efforts that require a bit of planning, but can be implemented within the next 3-6 months. Big Plays are more substantial efforts that take 6-18 months to fully accomplish.
TIPS
For examples of student surveys in action—and why they’re important—check out Inflexion CEO, Matt Coleman, sharing about them during a Crowdsource event.
Things to keep in mind when implementing your action plan:
- Administer the survey to students regularly, ideally once per quarter
- Focus on leading indicators
- Invest in human and social capital
- Kids can (and need to) see themselves in the curriculum
- Prioritize student voice in change efforts
- Focus on leading indicators
- 100 little things will move a mountain
About the Author
Dr. Matt Coleman is the CEO of Inflexion, where he leverages his deep-rooted expertise in school systems change to drive impactful educational reform. With a career spanning various roles—from educational assistant to assistant superintendent—Matt’s experience encompasses every level of secondary education.
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We want to hear from you! How was this experience for you/your school? Please comment on this post with your story, insights, tips, etc.
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