School Information finder update #1 The Parent Survey

Most of the questions asked how “useful” certain types of information were and then how useful the School Information Finder itself was. When the market researchers and the Ministry staff were asked “useful for what?” they had no clear answer.

The parents surveyed were not asked if the site was necessary; if they would rather have easy access to individual school’s websites; or if they would rather have school boards provide information about schools.

The researchers said one of the objectives of the research was to determine how the School Information Finder could best help to promote higher achievement in schools through increased accountability. The Partnership Table members were surprised to hear this as the site had not been explained to us this way before. The Ministry staff and the researchers were not able to provide any proof that increased accountability promotes higher achievement – though this is certainly a prevalent thought in places like the U.S. where No Child Left Behind provides rewards and punishments for changes in student test scores.

• 82% of parents look for information about the school their child is enrolled in (74% use the school’s website, 54% visited the school, 53% talked to other parents, 8% used the School Information Finder

• 60% look for general information (name of principal, number of students, grade range, language of school, location, contact information etc.); 46% look for information on student achievement

Then parents were asked about different kinds of information, and which kinds were most useful

• For general information the results ranged from a high of 88% deeming a link to the individual school website useful, to 69% saying they wanted to know about community access.

• For achievement information the results ranged from a high of 75% wanting to know the pass/failure rate to 70% wanting EQAO data.

•For program/class information, the results ranged from a high of 87% wanting to know if special classes were offered to a low of 50% wanting to know about child care.

• For information about the population of the school, the results were all relatively low: 43% thought it would be useful to know the percentage of special education students, 39% wanted to know how many students required ESL support and 32% wanted to know what percent of students lived in low-income households

Parents were asked “to what extent would you be interested in comparing the school their child is enrolled in – to other schools, and to similar schools:

• 58% said they’d be interested or very interested in comparing their child’s school to other schools

• 61% said they’d be interested in comparing their child’s school to similar schools

When asked to look at the actual School Information Finder, there were a range of responses:

• 48% said it would be very useful and 29% said it would be somewhat useful

• 59% said that the “Search for a School” feature was very useful, while 43% said the “School Profile” was very useful.

• 32% said they were very likely to return to the site