Understanding School Climate
Tool Kit
The single most common school climate finding that we have discovered in our work with thousands of schools across America is that adults (school personnel and parents/guardians) report that bully-victim-bystander behavior is a "mild" to "moderately severe" problem but students report that is a "severe" problem.
This Tool Kit is a resource designed to support school leadership teams and school community members prevent bully-victim behavior and promote upstander behavior in K-12 schools.
Feeling safe is a fundamental human need and provides the optimal foundation for student learning and positive youth development. When we work to transform school communities from a culture of passive bystanders to a culture of upstanders, we are not only promoting comprehensive and effective bully prevention efforts, we are also promoting the skills, knowledge and dispositions that provide the foundation for an engaged and responsibly citizenry.
This Tool Kit includes five modules that are organized around the following ideas and essential questions:
- Getting Started: In broad strokes, what does a comprehensive bully prevention/ pro-upstander effort mean and why is this important (Module One)
- A Snapshot: What does a school look like that has implemented an effective bully prevention/pro-upstander effort (Module Two)
- Creating the foundation: What kinds of team building work provide an essential foundation for this school climate reform effort (Module Three)
- Implementation: What are helpful school-wide, classroom and individual as well as school-home-community steps that support effective implementation efforts (Module Four)
- Sustainability: What kinds of activities support sustainability (Module Five)
The Tool Kit provides the foundation for our school climate improvement efforts with schools, districts, networks of schools and State Departments of Education. For further information about the Tool Kit, please click here.
