Questionnaire for Students

The questionnaire for students has been designed after consultation of existing questionnaires of student wellbeing as discussed below. The purpose of this questionnaire is to assess the level of student wellbeing for the 8 schools.

Questionnaire Design

The objectives of the student’s questionnaire were to measure student wellbeing, as one indication of school effectiveness. Student wellbeing includes student self-esteem and the appreciation of their school environment which is important for their personal development.

Questionnaires on student wellbeing were retrieved and studied. Two questionnaires were of some help; they were the ‘Student Self-esteem Inventory’ (1996) and student wellbeing (French version: Bien-Etre) (2014). The questionnaire on student self-esteem consists of 58 questions related to personal wellbeing and esteem and it also included few questions on school life. The one on student wellbeing consisted of different sections: self-esteem; social environment; school environment and climate; and relationships with teachers and friends. However, questions from these two questionnaires could not be used directly as they were not directly relevant to our objectives. Only few questions could be adapted and used in our student questionnaire.

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The structure of the student survey questionnaire required careful planning. As the focus was on student self-esteem and their school environment, consisting of their school, their teachers and their friends, it was decided to include the following 3 sections:

1. Student self esteem

2. Student and adults in their school 3. Student and their friends

Accordingly the ‘Student Self-esteem Inventory’ questionnaire and the student wellbeing questionnaire were studied; few relevant questions were reframed to make them more specific and clear to the students. Other questions were added in order to cover different aspects on the three themes. All the questions were formulated in such a way that they are clear and simple in order to elicit valid and relevant responses from the students.

Student self-esteem includes questions on the students’ views about their personal happiness and satisfaction. The second section is about the students’ perception of their school and the support they get from the adults at school. The last section on students and their friends is on how they get along with and can rely on their friends at school. These three sections cover the different aspects of student wellbeing in their school.

There were a total of 18 questions. The questions were presented in the form of positive statements. After thorough discussion, we decided to use two types of likert scale: a 3-point and a 5-point Likert scales based on the questions (refer to Annex 1d).

As for the educators’ questionnaire, issues of validity and reliability have been considered. To ensure reliability, the questions have been framed in such a way that they mean the same to everyone, hence maintaining the consistency of the scores. Item validity has also been taken care of so that the questions are accurate and relevant to the field of study.

The questionnaire was piloted in an MGI secondary school which was not involved in the actual survey. 20 students were given the questionnaire to fill. At the end of the questionnaire they were requested to write any comment, difficulty or suggestions on how to improve the questionnaire.

A few suggestions were obtained and accordingly some questions were reframed to improve their clarity.

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The pre-test was also carried out in the same manner as for the educators’ questionnaire. The data were entered in SPSS and the test for homogeneity of variance and internal reliability were carried out. As shown in the table below, for sections 2 and 3, Cronbach’s Alpha values were .71 and .73 respectively, which shows an acceptable level of internal reliability. For section 1, Cronbach Alpha was very low (.16), it is considered as unacceptable. For Factor Analysis, section 2 and 3 were extracted as one component showing good homogeneity of variance, whereas for section 1, there were 3 components extracted. Both the Cronbach’s Alpha and Factor analysis show that items in the section 1 on student self-esteem were not coherent and consistent;

hence the questions cannot be grouped as one theme; under the heading student self-esteem.

Table 6. Cronbach's Alpha and Factor Analysis for first Student Questionnaire

Section Cronbach’s

Alpha

Factor Analysis 1 Students’ self esteem .161 3 components 2 Students and adults in their school .733 1 component 3 Students and their friends .710 1 component

The student’s questionnaire was reorganized and questions were carefully reframed to improve homogeneity of variance and internal reliability. The final questionnaire therefore had 4 sections with 20 questions as follows:

1. Student self esteem 2. Social wellbeing

3. Student teacher relationship 4. Students and their friends

The student’s questionnaire is given in Annex 1e. As there have been some major changes in the questionnaire, it was piloted once more in order to ensure its validity and reliability.

Administering of Questionnaires

The 8 selected schools are the same as for the educators’ survey and they are different from the schools used for the pre-test and are named as schools A to H. All the 8 schools were visited to seek the collaboration of the rectors and the educators.

In each school, 60 students were targeted. The questionnaires were given to some teachers working with form 4 as the target population was students aged between 14 to 15 years. The educators were requested to administer the questionnaire in class and to ensure that students

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respond individually without the assistance of their friends. After 1 week, the educators were contacted by phone and the questionnaires were collected.

Analysis techniques

Responses from the survey questionnaires from students have been analysed with the use of Microsoft word, Microsoft excel and SPSS 17 software. Descriptive statistics have been used to present data in tabular and diagrammatic forms and inferential statistics have been used for comparing and analysing data, using parametric and non-parametric tests. A systematic data processing was carried out:

1. Feeding all data for 429 students and 25 questions in SPSS.

2. Organize the data into sections.

3. Carry out item validity and internal reliability tests.

4. Analyse and compare the sections.

5. Carry out cross analysis with Educator’s data.

6. Carry out correlation and regression analyses.

Problems Encountered

As for the educators survey, the student survey was carried out twice, first with 20 schools as a pre-test, followed by the actual survey with 8 schools. As the schools involved in the research are spread in all four educational zones, it was quite tedious to visit all of them. An appointment was taken from each rector and in a number of cases the response was not positive, so they had to be contacted several times.

However, the collection of the questionnaires was much easier compared to the educators’

survey, except for school D where the questionnaires were misplaced and had to be provided again.