Research suggests that school climate can have a great impact on student, teacher, and school outcomes. However, it is often assessed as a summary measure, without taking into account multiple perspectives (student, teacher, parent) or examining subdimensions within the broader construct. In this study, we assessed school climate from the perspective of students, staff, and parents within a large, urban school district using multilevel modeling techniques to examine within- and between-school variance. After adjusting for school-level demographic characteristics, students reported worse perceptions of and compared to both parent and staff ratings (all < 0.05). Parents gave the lowest ratings of , and staff gave the lowest ratings of (s < 0.05). Findings demonstrate the importance of considering the type of informant when evaluating climate ratings within a school. Understanding how perceptions differ between informants can inform interventions to improve perceptions and prevent adverse outcomes.

This research analyzes the impact of the Adjusted Voucher Lawś school rankings on low-performing schools in Santiago, Chile, and provides evidence on the effects of the pressures of accountability systems on teacher policies and practices. The empirical strategy is based on the fact that schools are ranked according to their position on a set of thresholds. We used a generalization of the traditional regression discontinuity design for the case where treatment assignment is determined by variables. To gather information on teacher policies and practices, we conducted a survey of 4th-grade teachers in the Greater Santiago area. The results indicate that low-performing schools responded to the treatment by implementing policies that seek to improve their results in the short term. We also found no significant effects on teaching practices, suggesting that many of these changes are implemented top down from the school administrators, without involving teachers in the process.