Adopt School Policies and Practices that Promote Student Sense of Belonging
Addresses Risk Factor:
Limited Commitment to the Value of School
Youth who no longer find value in school as a learning environment that will contribute to their lives are at higher risk of substance use, violence, delinquency, teen pregnancy, and dropping out of school.
Increases Protective Factor:
School Rewards for Prosocial Involvement
When youth are recognized and rewarded by their parents and teachers and feel safe at school, protection increases and they are less likely to be involved in substance use and delinquency.
How does this strategy address these risk factors and protective factor?
The Colorado Department of Education defines a positive school climate as “the work of a school community to create a quality experience for all students, staff, and families.” A positive school climate attends to each of the following: (a) fostering safety; (b) promoting a supportive academic, disciplinary, and physical environment; and (c) encouraging and maintaining respectful, trusting, and caring relationships throughout the school community. [1]
Safe and positive school climates create a sense of belonging for students, staff, and families. For students, this sense of belonging contributes to increased attendance and engagement in school, higher grades, decreased discipline incidences and drop out rates, all of which lead to increased academic achievement and lower participation in risk activities. For staff, this sense of belonging enhances staff wellbeing and retention and decreases emotional exhaustion and burnout. [2]
Students who feel that adults and peers at school know and care about them feel a stronger sense of belonging at school, leading to greater mental and emotional well-being and better success academically. What’s more, students who feel these connections at school are more likely to reach out for and respond to offers of support. [3]
Our schools struggle most in creating true belonging among students with marginalized identities including our students who are BIPOC, LGBTQ+, students living in poverty, differently abled learners and English Language Learners. As such, systems change focused on equity and inclusion is central to all proven best practices to create safe school environments. For example, students who are LGBTQ+ experience schools as hostile environments with distressing frequency, with 86.3% of students surveyed reporting experiences of harassment based on personal characteristics, 59.1% feeling unsafe at school and 32.7% missing school in the last month because of feeling unsafe. A concerning 71.8% further avoid extracurricular activities - which are otherwise proven to increase student well-being, belonging and school success - because of feeling unsafe or unwelcome. [4] It is critical that we prioritize efforts and systems change to create safe and welcoming school environments for all students.
Before You Begin
Understand the importance of safe school climates and student sense of belonging at school. In order to promote student sense of belonging, you must first have a clear understanding of what contributes to and the importance of safe school climates for all students.
Resources:
The Colorado Department of Education offers a variety of resources on school climate, including guidance on how to measure it.
The Learning Policy Institute's report, “Creating Identity-Safe Schools and Classrooms,” discusses how to build inclusive and affirming schools that can support all students in feeling safe, protected, and valued in school environments.
“The Science of School Belonging” discusses the role schools play in making children feel like they belong and the National Association of Secondary School Principals explores the importance of belonging.
Understand the racial inequities that are related to this strategy and consider the systemic and structural causes of disparities of student experiences within schools. By understanding the factors that contribute racial inequities related to this strategy, your coalition will be better able to identify the action that needs to be taken. Additionally, new and/or existing policies and systems-level approaches have the potential to exacerbate existing inequities within schools, making it important for your coalition to critically examine your action plan for signs of negative consequences.
Resources:
Learn about what contributes to racial inequities within schools here.
Learn about the importance of uprooting structural racism in schools via the National School Board Association. This webinar also discusses the “search for racial justice in education”.
Culturally Responsive Education shares research on solutions to increasing belonging among students of color.
Dismantling Institutional Racism in Education is an initiative launched by the National School Board Association to assist state school boards associations and other education leaders in addressing racial inequities
Understand the exclusion and hostility experienced by LGBTQ+ students in schools. There are also documented disparities in the experiences of students that identify as LGBTQ+ in schools. Understanding these experiences will help your coalition support schools in promoting belonging among all students.
Resources:
Identify and connect with other organizations and individuals working or interested in this area, as well as those that hold decision-making power. Working with other organizations and/or individuals is the best way to maximize your coalition’s power and allows for a greater influence. Before selecting implementation activities, your coalition should take time to understand who is already working in this space, who has power to influence decision making, and what efforts are already underway. Reaching out to these organizations and individuals can help you form partnerships and learn from current and/or previous systems-level work in this area.
Resources:
The National Academy of Community Organizers offers A Guide to Power Analysis in Community Organizing, which can help coalitions understand where power sits within a community around a particular issue.
Implementation Activities Aligned to Research
It is important to note that the uniqueness of your community, its resources, and its needs will ultimately determine what implementation of this strategy will look like. Additionally, it is important for your coalition to approach this strategy in a way that is aligned with your overarching goal(s). The list below offers suggestions and ideas of evidence-informed actions your coalition can consider taking as part of your implementation of this strategy.
Educate stakeholders on the importance of student belonging in schools and how it is impacted by evaluating and improving school climate. Schools balance a variety of competing priorities, but ensuring positive, safe school climates for all students should be paramount.
Resources:
Schoolsafety.gov offers a variety of resources on school climate, including resources, strategies, and tools.
The Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment (CDPHE) offers “A Positive School Climate Toolkit for Health Practitioners”, which provides an introduction into how public health practitioners can use their expertise to create meaningful partnerships with schools and work to strengthen a positive school climate.
Address discipline disparities. Research has abundantly demonstrated the negative impacts on students of punitive school discipline. Rather than improving behaviors, discipline practices like suspension and expulsion are more likely to negatively impact behavior and safety, both for the student involved and the school as a whole. Significant disparities in school discipline have also been shown nationwide, shining a light on the disproportional impacts of this problem across our education system. Black students in the US are 3.2 times more likely to be suspended or expelled than their White peers, Native American students are 2.0 times more likely, and Hispanic/Latinx students are 1.3 times more likely. Special education students and homeless students are both about 2.5 times more likely to be suspended and students identified as “at-risk” of academic failure because of poverty or performance are 2.71 times more likely to be suspended than their peers. Punitive discipline pushes our students out of their school community, just when they need it most. And it does so with bias against those students who are already most marginalized by our systems. To effect systems change in school discipline, both the discipline itself and biases in its implementation must be addressed.
Understand the negative impact of punitive school discipline and its disparities on students
Resources:
Understand evidence-based preventative and responsive approaches to discipline to replace punitive approaches.
Resources:
Resources:
School and District Discipline Policies and Procedures are generally available online. If you have any trouble finding them, contact your school administrator or district office and they should be able to easily provide you with copies.
Colorado Compilation of School Discipline Laws and Regulations
Educate stakeholders to understand and advocate for the centrality of deep equity in this work.
Resources:
While the changes listed above have been proven to reduce punitive and exclusionary discipline, they have not been shown to be consistently effective at reducing the disparities in discipline except when implemented alongside racial equity focused professional development for leadership and staff. Additional evidence shows that a focus on improving teacher-student relationships can reduce disparities in disciplinary practices, in significant and sustained ways. Finally, considerable research shows the need to diversify the teacher workforce and suggests the potential for that representation to positively impact discipline disparities.
Educate stakeholders on evidence-based systems and practices that contribute increased student belonging. There are a variety of policies and systems-level practices that schools can implement to increase belonging of all students. Understanding each school’s unique needs, challenges, and students’ experiences can help understand which approach(es) are best suited for their context.
Cultural Competence and Responsiveness, Inclusiveness and Trauma-Informed Practices
Resources:
Resources:
Learning Models that embrace Social Determinants of Health and the Whole Child
Resources:
Educate stakeholders on systems and policy changes that can create safe and positive school climates for LGBTQ+ students. There are three key activities schools can take in this areas: policy development and enforcement, staff training, and creating and supporting student groups.
Resources:
Inclusive, enumerated policies are a critical tool for creating safe and supportive schools for LGBTQ and all youth. Enumerated policies are policies that explicitly list characteristics or traits of students that may be the subject of bullying and harassment at school. Learn more here.
Dissemination of school, district and state policies is important so that students and families are aware of their rights and can advocate for those rights and/or policy changes.
Federal Title IX Title IX interpretation, as it relates to sexual orientation and gender identity, has varied with each administration. In June 2021, President Biden’s administration affirmed that Title IX prohibits discrimination on the basis of gender identity and sexual orientation in all education institutions that receive federal funding.
Colorado law also protects students from bullying. Colorado House Bill 11-1254, section 22-32-109 (1)(11)(I) defines bullying as “any written or verbal expression, or physical or electronic act or gesture, or pattern thereof, that is intended to coerce, intimidate, or cause any physical, mental, or emotional harm to any student” and states that “bullying is prohibited against any student for any reason”
Model Policy: The Colorado Model Bullying Prevention and Education Policy can be found in the Colorado Bullying Prevention and Education Best Practices and Model Policy document below. The use of a best practices guide is an approach taken by many states to provide evidence-based resources to put the model policy in context. Additional bullying prevention resources can be found on the CDE Bullying Prevention Resources web page.
For more information and resources on these State and Federal protections, see Gender / Sexual Orientation | CDE
As of 2018, over 80% of Colorado’s 178 School Districts included protection of LGBTQ+ students in their anti-bullying policies. Safe Schools for LGBTQ Students: A Look Back at Colorado's Anti-Bullying Efforts
School personnel support and training can educate teachers and other school staff on how to support LGBTQ+ youth as a best practice for improving safety and connectedness in schools for both LGBTQ+ youth and their cisgender, heterosexual peers. Examples of this professional development include:
Support for Gender and Sexuality Alliances and other advocacy/support organizations serving youth and schools.
- Colorado Department of Education: School Climate Transformation Office https://www.cde.state.co.us/dropoutprevention/schoolclimateandculturalproficiency and https://www.cde.state.co.us/schoolclimate
- Understanding and Cultivating a Positive School Climate, Office of School Culture and Climate at Colorado Department of Education in partnership with the Prevention and Research Center and Human and Family Development Studies Colorado State University, 2020; retrieved from https://www.cde.state.co.us/schoolclimate/schoolclimatewhitepaper
- Why student belonging matters and how principals can support it, Principal Leadership vol.21, National Association of Secondary School Principals October 2020 retrieved from https://www.nassp.org/publication/principal-leadership/volume-21-2020-2021/principal-leadership-october-2020/why-student-belonging-matters-october-2020/
- The 2019 National School Climate Survey:The Experiences of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, and Queer Youth in Our Nation’s Schools, Joseph G. Kosciw, Ph.D. Caitlin M. Clark, Ph.D. Nhan L. Truong, Ph.D. Adrian D. Zongrone, M.P.H., GLSEN 2020 retrieved from https://www.glsen.org/research/2019-national-school-climate-survey