Development and Initial Validation of the School Characteristics Checklist in Bangalore City

Abstract

School data is vital for identifying problems early and implementing awareness and intervention programs. Schools in India vary in various features such as their governing body, management type, board affiliation, number of grades, teaching medium, infrastructure, and facilities, etc. These heterogeneous characteristics, when included in a sample, lead to measurement errors and ultimately unclear conclusions. The school characteristics checklist outlines certain features of schools, which can be used to determine a homogeneous sample.  The development of a school characteristics checklist and its content validity using expert judgment is reported in this article. The administration of the validated checklist among schools in urban Bengaluru is described. The checklist is easy to use, reduces confounding variables, and minimizes measurement errors. It makes the data collection method more scientific, structured, and reduces bias. Researchers conducting studies among school students, teachers, and school authorities can use the checklist to make their sample more representative. Scope for improvement includes establishing criterion-related validity, construct validity and reliability.