Development and validation of domain specific school diversity model scales among pupils and teachers: A multilevel approach

Abstract

The present study consisted of the development and validation of a novel multi-rater Domain-Specific School Diversity Model scale (DS-SDM) that captures pupils' and teachers' perceptions of the extent to which their school adopts assimilationist, colorblind, and pluralist approaches to the domains of (a) languages, (b) religions, (c) the curriculum, and (d) students' identities. Using data collected from 3073 students ages 10–12 years and 816 teachers from 59 primary schools in Flanders, Belgium, we performed multilevel exploratory factor analyses and confirmatory factor analyses to evaluate these novel scales. We identified a total of nine measurement scales among students and seven among teachers that were reliable (internal consistency range = 0.63–0.86) and invariant across different subgroups of pupils (i.e., ethnic minoritized versus majority pupils). Interestingly, we found that perceptions by pupils and teachers within the same school were often notably different, especially in the domains of curriculum and identities. Overall, this study offers novel tools to capture perceptions of school diversity models among students and teachers in more nuanced and domain-specific ways. As such, it paves the way for future school psychological or educational studies and interventions targeting domain-specific diversity practices that are most strongly related to ethnic minoritized and majority students' well-being and school achievement.