Spring 2025 SOWK 587 Week 03 - Schools as Organizations - Understanding the Landscape

School Climate vs School Culture: Perceptions vs. Values/Beliefs

School climate and culture are essential concepts to review when considering the landscape of schools. Gruenert and Whitaker (2023) argue that school climate and culture are distinct concepts. They define that:

“A school’s climate is both a window into its culture and a learned response that the culture teaches new members”

Culture tends to be the long-term reasons why we do things, and it is changed over a long period of time based on addressing climate.

Climate	Culture
Short-Term	Long-Term
What you do	Why you do it
Indicates type culture	Changed through climate

[Content Note] ✅ Competency B

Reference

Gruenert, S., & Whitaker, T. (2023). School culture versus school climate. Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development. Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development (ASCD). https://ascd.org/blogs/school-culture-versus-school-climate

Definition of School Climate

The National School Climate Council (n.d., 2017) combines the topics of climate and culture and focuses on climate as specific topics. We are going to use their definition of school climate.

School climate

refers to the quality and character of school life
is based on patterns demonstrated across constituents’ (students, parents, and personnel) experiences and how they are enacted in school life (norms, goals, values, interpersonal relationships, teaching and learning practices, and organizational structures).

They define that climate is made up of:

Norms, values and expectations that support people feeling socially, emotionally and physically safe.
People are engaged and respected.
Students, families and educators work together to develop, live and contribute to a shared school vision.
Educators model and nurture attitudes that emphasize the benefits and satisfaction gained from learning.
Each person contributes to the operations of the school and the care of the physical environment.

[Content Note] ✅ Competency B

Reference

National School Climate Council. (n.d.). What is school climate and why is it important? https://schoolclimate.org/school-climate/

National School Climate Council. (2007). The school climate challenge: Narrowing the gap between school climate research and school climate policy, practice guidelines, and teacher education policy. National School Climate Center (NSCC), Center for Social and Emotional Education (CSEE), National Center for Learning and Citizenship (NCLC) at Education Commission of the States (ECS). https://schoolclimate.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/school-climate-challenge-web.pdf

What Is Your School’s Climate Like

I want you to talk about your school’s climate related to the criteria used in a survey that some schools use to assess school climate. We will speak generally about the domains evaluated by The Comprehensive School Climate Inventory (CSCI). It is not the inventory, but I think it can provide some meaningful discussion.

[Small Group Activity] Discuss Aspects of School Climate

Move to be in groups within the same district, but you will have to include 2 or 3 districts
Go to the PDF The 14 Dimensions of School Climate Measured by the CSCI
Talk about each dimension and what you think perceptions might be.

[Whole Group Activity] Debrief discussion

What stands out about some of the school culture you discussed?
Was there one aspect that felt particularly successful or needing extra support?
What are strategies for creating change in our districts?

The content of the 14 Dimensions includes the following:

Safety

Rules and Norms
Sense of Physical Security
Sense of Social-Emotional Security
Online Safety

Teaching and Learning

Support for Academic Learning
Social and Emotional Learning

Interpersonal Relationships

Respect for Diversity
Teacher-Student Relationships
Peer Relationships

Institutional Environment

School Connectedness
Physical Surroundings
Social Inclusion

Leadership and Efficacy

Administration and Leadership
Collective Efficacy

[Content Note] ✅ Competency B

RTI – MTSS – PBIS

Working in schools you will quickly come across many presentations with triangles. RTI and PBIS are commonly discussed as is MTSS. They all provide a format for how we bring support to students in a school setting.

RTI - Response to Intervention

Focused on academic focused and format for determining special education services.

PBIS - Positive Behavior Intervention and Supports

Focused on social, emotional, and behavioral needs. Often a set of strategies

MTSS - Multi-Tiered Systems of Support

Can be both academic and behavioral.

[Content Note] ✅ Competency B

Reference

Raetz, P. B., & Winter, B. L. (2018). Response to intervention. In C. R. Reynolds, K. J. Vannest, & E. Fletcher-Janzen (Eds.), Encyclopedia of Special Education, Volume 4: A Reference for the Education of Children, Adolescents, and Adults Disabilities and Other Exceptional Individuals (p. 1045). John Wiley & Sons.

Zhang, J., Martella, R. C., Kang, S., & Yenioglu, B. Y. (2023). Response to intervention (RTI)/multi-tiered systems of support (MTSS): A nationwide analysis. Journal of Educational Leadership and Policy Studies, 7(1).

Levels of Intervention

Within the different systems and across different frameworks sometimes the overall percentages are different, the tiers and percentages are generally as follows:

Tier 1 (Core Programming or Universal) - 80-90% Use of high-leverage practices and evidence-based practices; aligned with state or district standards; use of differentiated instruction.

Tier 2 (Supplemental Intervention or Indicated) - 5-10% Standardized interventions that are supplemented and for small-groups (through not always delivered in a small-group setting).

Their 3 (Indicated, Intensive Intervention, or Individualized) - 1-5% Individualized and intensive interventions for students with ongoing needs

[Content Note] ✅ Competency B

Reference

American Institutes for Research. (n.d.) What is Multi-Tiered System of Supports (MTSS)? https://mtss4success.org/resource/what-is-mtss

Sailor, W., Dunlap, G., Sugai, G., & Horner, R. (2008). Handbook of Positive Behavior Support. Springer Science & Business Media. https://play.google.com/store/books/details?id=TW8go24dqDkC