The importance of school climate in the school environment is well established as Halpin and Croft (1963) describe it as the personality of the school, while Freiberg and Stein (1999) describe it as the “heart and soul of a school” (p. 11). Literature on school climate demonstrates that school climate is associated with student academic outcomes (Lee & Smith, 1999; Hamre &
Pianta, 2001; Sherblom, Marshall, & Sherblom, 2006; Niehaus, Rudasill, & Rakes, 2011), and student behavioral and psychological outcomes (Steffgen, Recchia, & Viechtbauer, 2013; Wang et al., 2015; Thapa, Cohen, & Higgins-D’Alessandro, 2013). Further, a positive school climate is associated with reduced peer victimization and bullying (Wang, Berry, & Swearer, 2013),
For instance, in a review of over 200 references, Thapa et al. (2013) identified five core dimensions of school climate: safety
(e.g., clear and consistent rules), relationships (e.g., diversity), teaching and learning (e.g., support for professional relationships), institutional environment (e.g., adequate resources), and school improvement processes (i.e., changes made using evidence-based research). Zullig et al.
(2010) based on reviews of historical school climate measures found overlapping but different five common domains: (a) school connectedness (i.e., the extent to which students feel engaged and valued), (b) order, safety, and discipline (i.e., the extent that students feel safe, respected and perceive rules and fairness in the disciplinary structure), (c) social relationships (i.e., quality of interpersonal relationships), (d) academic outcomes (i.e., academic atmosphere) and, (e) school facilities (i.e., features or conditions of the material