Multivariate approaches to school climate factors and school outcomes

School climate is a crucial concept used to explain school differences. Nevertheless, this concept is elusive in the literature, conveying different meanings. To address the relation between school climate and school outcomes, its historical roots are reviewed and a multivariate approach to it is proposed, in contrast to a unidimensional conception. In four papers, this strategy is used to study associations among various school climate factors (SCFs) and school outcomes, including teacher turnover, teacher job satisfaction, students’ math achievement, and students’ social attitudes. In paper 1, schools serving more socioeconomically disadvantaged students are found to present higher rates of teacher turnover. A complementary study shows that SCFs (supportive school leadership, positive school relationships, and academic monitoring) present differing effects on teacher turnover. In paper 2, the relationships between SCFs (teacher student relations and school discipline) and teachers’ job satisfaction and withdrawal cognitions (intentions to quit) are estimated. These SCFs appear to play a protective role with respect to teachers’ withdrawal cognitions, and these effects are indirect via their relationship to teachers’ job satisfaction. In paper 3, the relationship between the experience of bullying and students’ achievement is addressed. The relationship is found to be indirect, with key roles played by perceptions of school belonging and students’ classroom engagement. Finally, in paper 4 the relationship between civic knowledge and the endorsement of democratic values is estimated. This link is found to be partially mediated by ideological beliefs (authoritarianism), and the role of open classroom discussion (a SCF) as a moderator of these effects is demonstrated. This work demonstrates that in order to specify theory-driven models of different school outcomes, school climate should be conceptualized as diverse social-contextual effects operating in a complex multivariate setting with mediated and moderated pathways to outcomes.