SCLS Pilot Test 2015 Materials Revisions Memo

Memorandum United States Department of Education

Institute of Education Sciences

National Center for Education Statistics

DATE: February 3, 2015

TO: Shelly Martinez, Office of Management and Budget

THROUGH: Kashka Kubzdela, NCES

FROM: Isaiah O’Rear, NCES

SUBJECT: School Climate Surveys (SCLS) Pilot Test 2015 update (OMB No. 1850-0803 v.129)

The following revisions were made to the attached documents describing the School Climate Surveys (SCLS) Cognitive, Pilot, and Field Test Studies System that was approved in December 2014 (OMB# 1850-0803 v.119):

1. Per our response to OMB passback in December 2014 (OMB# 1850-0803 v.119), we are attaching the finalized Platform Instructions and Technical and Administrative Guide in the revised Attachment 4. The changes from the draft included in the previous clearance to this final version of the instructions and guide are as follows:

   1. The pledge for the survey administrator (approved as Appendix C of the guide in the OMB# 1850-0803 v.119 package) has also been added to the system instructions:

I hereby certify that I have carefully read and will cooperate fully with the SCLS procedures on confidentiality. I will keep completely confidential all information arising from surveys concerning individual respondents to which I may gain access. I will not discuss, disclose, disseminate, or provide access to survey data and identifiers. I will devote my best efforts to ensure that there is compliance with the required procedures by personnel whom I supervise. I give my personal pledge that I shall abide by this assurance of confidentiality.

[checkbox] I have read and agree to the Pledge of Confidentiality.

2. The administration and technical guides have been combined into one document and the following changes were made:

   1. Procedures for installation and configuration of the SCLS platform (section 2.1) have been added.

   2. Theoretical background has been moved to become the appendix A.1.

   3. Features of the SCLS platform have been moved to become the appendix B.

   4. Questionnaires (previously in appendix E) have been taken out. Attachment 1 provides all questionnaires.

   5. Text has been updated throughout to make the guide more user friendly.

   6. The confidentiality language in the system stays the same, but it is no longer editable. The educational agencies can enter additional confidentiality language and the added language will appear after the provided confidentiality language.

2. One item below has been added to the student questionnaire per request from the Office of Safe and Healthy Students (OSHS). As a result, volume I, attachment 1 (questionnaires), and attachment 2 (justification tables) have been updated:

   1. Sengrel153: At this school, there is a teacher or some other adult who students can go to if they need help because of sexual assault or dating violence.

3. One item was deleted from the student questionnaire per request from the Office of Safe and Healthy Students (OSHS). As a result, volume I and attachment 1 (questionnaires) have been updated:

   1. Ienvphea118: This school provides adequate physical health and nutrition services for students.

4. The word “cultural” was inserted into Sengclc8: “Students from different cultural backgrounds get along well at this school”. This omission was an error on the English questionnaire submitted last time; it is now consistent with the previously approved justification table.

5. For consistency with the parent questionnaire, the phrase “or guardians” was inserted in the principal questionnaire in NPsaferm93: “[Principal Only] This school notifies parents or guardians in case of a school-wide emergency”.

6. The explanation “(e.g., self-control, problem solving, or getting along with others)” was inserted in Pengrel10: “This school helps me figure out what social and emotional skills my child needs to develop (e.g., self-control, problem solving, or getting along with others)”. This omission was an error on the English questionnaire submitted last time; it is now consistent with the previously approved justification table.

7. For consistency, the following general definition, which was included in the approved parent questionnaire, was added to all questionnaires (Attachment 1: pages 1-S-2, 1-l-1, 1-N-1):

   1. Throughout the survey, "This school" means activities happening in school buildings, on school grounds, on school buses, and at places that hold school-sponsored events or activities. Unless otherwise specified, this refers to normal school hours or to times when school activities/events were in session.

8. “Attachment 2 SCLS Pilot Test 2015 - Justification Table” was recreated to assure that the order of the survey items matches those in Attachment 1 (the questionnaires).

The Volume 1 in this submission is a verbatim copy of that approved in December 2014 (OMB# 1850-0803 v.119), with the following 3 edits: (a) the summary of the number of survey items was adjusted to reflect the one addition and one deletion indicated above; (b) a note was added to the burden table (Table 2) stating: “In this submission we are listing the burden as 1 respondent, 1 response, and 1 burden hour, because the full amount of burden hours, as shown in Table 2, has been already approved and subtracted from the 1850-0803 generic clearance allowance. ”; and (c) the last sentence under the Cognitive Laboratory section was revised to: “The cognitive interviews and usability testing report was included as Attachment 5 in the submission approved in December 2014 (OMB# 1850-0803 v.119).” Attachment 3 (Communication Materials) has not changed. It is included with this submission to reflect the continued use of the recruitment materials through the end of this pilot test.