Trauma-sensitive school concepts for students with a refugee background: a review of international studies.

Children and adolescents with a refugee background are at high risk for traumatization. Once they arrive in safe countries, schools are the institutions where teachers are responsible for caring for them sensitively and competently. Furthermore, schools are organized in learning groups consisting of multiple peers of the same age, which provides excellent opportunities for social learning and experiences of social support. In this respect, schools are the appropriate places where preventive concepts can be applied to students with a refugee background. This systematic review summarizes studies that examine or evaluate existing international concepts of trauma-sensitive schools for supporting traumatized students with a refugee background. Based on N = 41 selected articles, 17 relevant concepts of trauma-sensitive schools were identified. In 35.3% of the concepts, traumatized students with a refugee background are explicitly included in the target group of the concept, while 47.1% of the concepts refer to groups of students with trauma as a result of various adverse childhood experiences, which also occur more frequently within the population of refugee children and adolescents 17.6% of the concepts contain specific adaptations for pupils with a refugee background. The majority of these concepts were developed in the United States. Additional concepts can be reported for Australia, the United Kingdom, Turkey, and Cambodia. Based on available empirical data, no significant effectiveness regarding the researched concepts' effects on academic and other school-related data can be determined. Although some studies indicate positive effects concerning school-related target variables, most of the studies have only limited significance due to inadequate research designs and methodological deficiencies. Therefore, there is a great need for further development, careful implementation, and evaluation of trauma-sensitive concepts in schools, especially for the growing group of refugee students.

Cross-cultural connections: School climate and equity in Germany, Italy, Latvia, and the United States.

In recent decades, much international research has been carried out on school climate and its relationship with learning, socioemotional, and health outcomes (Berkowitz et al., 2017; La Salle, Rocha-Neves, et al., 2021; Pizmony-Levy et al., 2019). Limited research has been carried out to investigate the relationship between school climate and educational inequalities, with particular reference to the results obtained by minoritized students. This contribution focuses on this issue, and it is organized as follows. First, The International School Climate Collaborative, which led to the cross-cultural adaptation of the Georgia School Climate Survey, is presented with normative data for the use of the survey with secondary school students in four countries: Germany, Italy, Latvia, and the United States (La Salle, Rocha-Neves, et al., 2021). Second, the theme of the relationship between School Climate and Educational Equity is focused on the basis of the most recent scientific literature. Third, the theme of the relationship between School Climate and Educational Equity is focused on comparing four countries: the United States, Germany, Italy, and Latvia. Fourth, the practical implications are investigated, focusing on three possible interventions that could be useful for improving the school climate while promoting equity and valuing cultural differences. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).

Measurement Efficiency of a Teacher Rating Scale to Screen for Students at Risk for Social, Emotional, and Behavioral Problems.

Teacher rating scales are broadly used for psycho-educational assessment in schools. In particular, they play an important role in screening students for social, emotional, and behavioral problems. In order to optimize the efficiency of these measures, it is important to minimize the number of items comprising them while maintaining sound psychometric characteristics. This study examines the measurement efficiency of a teacher rating scale for student social, emotional, and behavioral risk. The goal was to shorten an existing behavior screening tool. A total of 139 classroom teachers and 2566 students from Grades 1-6 (Mage = 8.96 years, SD = 1.61) participated in the study. In sum, 35 items assessing internalizing and externalizing behavior problems were analyzed applying the item response theory (generalized partial credit model). The results show that social, emotional, and behavioral risks can be captured with a total of 12 items. This reduction of almost 66% of the initial item pool would take teachers about 90 s to fill out for one student. Thus, the rating scale can be used by teachers in an efficient yet psychometrically sound manner.

A multinational study exploring adolescent perception of school climate and mental health.

School climate is a topic of increasing importance internationally. The current study investigated the established measurement invariance of an eight-factor school climate scale using a multinational sample of secondary students. School climate factor means across 14 international groups were compared and findings on the association between school climate factors and mental health were also investigated. Findings, from this study, illustrate several cross-national similarities regarding the ways in which secondary students perceive school climate and the influence of school climate on student mental health. These findings can support school psychologists' efforts to identify strategies and supports that improve the school environment in areas that are most consistently related to student experiences, such as school safety and school connectedness. Implications, limitations, and future directions are discussed. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2021 APA, all rights reserved).

A universal behavioral screener linked to personalized classroom interventions: Psychometric characteristics in a large sample of German schoolchildren.

The current study represents the first psychometric evaluation of an American English into German translation of a school-based universal screening measure designed to assess academic and disruptive behavior problems. This initial study examines the factor structure and diagnostic accuracy of the newly translated measure in a large sample of 1009 German schoolchildren attending grades 1-6 in Western Germany. Confirmatory factor analysis supported a two-factor model for both male- and female- students. Configural invariance was supported between male- and female-samples. However scalar invariance was not supported, with higher thresholds for ratings of female students. Results of receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve analyses were indicative of good to excellent diagnostic accuracy with areas under the curve ranging from 0.89 to 0.93. Optimal cut-off scores were 10, 5, and 13 for the Academic Productivity/Disorganization, Oppositional/Disruptive, and the Total Problems Composite scores of the Integrated System Teacher Rating Form respectively. This initial study of the newly translated measure supports further investigations into its utility for universal screening in German speaking schools.