Survey results now live!
Results from the annual Family-School Relationships Survey are now live. The survey provides insights that allow us to measure year-over-year trends for your school and the district to ensure we are best serving you and your child. Evaluating how well we are doing is central to living out our strengths and goals in our strategic plan, ELEVATE.
Click “Adams 12 Five Star Schools” to see district-wide results or select your school from the “55 Schools” dropdown menu to see results for your specific school. There are multiple tabs on the results page. You can see the results of the student survey on social-emotional well-being on the “Students” tab and the results for the Family-School Relationships Survey on the “Family Members” tab.
District Strengths and Areas of Improvement
This past year was full of unprecedented challenges and the results from the Family-School Relationships Survey certainly reflect the difficulties that we all faced. Although the survey couldn’t be changed to include specific COVID-19-related issues, the data represents how the pandemic adversely affected the relationships between schools and families and how families felt about supporting their children’s learning during this time.
Opportunities for Improvement
When it comes to confidence in supporting a child’s learning at home, we saw a 19% decrease this year compared to last year. Parents taking on a more hands-on role during remote and hybrid learning provided a new perspective to this question. More than ever before, parents of students of all ages had to step in to assist students in getting online, help them understand lessons and how to complete work, as well as monitor progress. With conditions improving and more students going back to in-person learning four days a week this year and the hope that next school year will be nearly back to normal, we are confident this number will improve in time.
Another area that we feel will improve as we emerge from the pandemic is how parents interact with staff and schools. Staff and family relationships saw a 13% decrease from last year. Due to health and safety protocols, families simply couldn’t visit teachers in-person and it was difficult to get more involved with their schools by volunteering or fundraising. Many parents also noted that they weren’t aware of how to help at their school or what their school’s needs were. So there is an opportunity to be more open and clear about how parents can contribute and engage.
Another category that is an area for improvement is “Grit,” which saw a 9% decrease from last year. This area assesses how well students are able to persevere through setbacks to achieve important long-term goals. While the majority of respondents (60%) said their student was quite likely or extremely likely to try again after failing to reach a goal, having 40% of students not likely to try again is a number we want to improve. As more students get back to in-person learning and can access more social-emotional learning support, we anticipate this number will rise.
Areas of Strength
While many areas of the survey trended downward or flat this year, there were some areas of strength that we can highlight. The area of the survey that measured how much respect children have for school staff rose 4% this year. Knowing that teachers and other school staff had to go above and beyond to learn new technology, transition lesson plans between remote and in-person learning models and engage with students in different ways, this feedback is heartening. Likewise, the respect teachers have for students rose 1% this year. Just as teachers had to adjust to the new normal, students had to be flexible with different learning models, adapt to new technology and endure isolation from classmates and teachers. These positive numbers show we are moving onward together!
A new section of the survey this year was about school resource officers (SROs) and it has shown to be another area of strength for the district. Overall, 77% of respondents responded favorably to questions about having an SRO in their child’s school. In particular, the question about how comfortable your child feels around police/SROs received an 89% positive response rate. Additionally, 61% of respondents said it was important to have a school resource officer present at their child’s school. Enhancing safety in our schools is one of the focus areas of our strategic plan, ELEVATE, and having SROs present on school campuses play a part in ensuring our students have safe and secure learning environments.
Winners of the Survey Competition!
For a fun challenge to encourage families to take the survey, schools competed against other like schools in receiving the most completed surveys. Schools were grouped with other similar schools by level and demographics and competed for a chance to earn seed money for a celebration with students and families at the schools.
Winners were in two categories: highest percentage of families taking the survey per school community; and highest percentage of growth from last year to this year.
Overall winner for highest percentage of families taking the survey: Coyote Ridge
Overall winner for highest growth of amount of survey takers from last year to this year: Silver Creek
