School Climate, Teacher Stress and Burn out: The Effect of a Social and Emotional Learning Program on Teacher Perceptions and Performance

RULER is a whole-school SEL approach designed to improve student engagement by integrating the teaching of emotional intelligence skills into regular classroom instruction. Prior research on the effects of RULER has focused primarily on classroom-level processes and outcomes: classrooms in schools randomly assigned to implement RULER demonstrated higher degrees of warmth and connectedness between teachers and students, more autonomy and leadership among students, and more student-centered learning, and that these emotional climate changes lead to improvements in classroom organization and instructional support. It is possible, however, that these changes in classroom-processes could in turn shift school-level processes, such as improved school climate and overall administrative functioning.

In this paper we examine the extent to which RULER impacts the relationship between teacher perceptions of school climate and teacher stress and burn out using data from a randomized control trial of RULER in 64 schools. In our sample, we examine the perceptions and performance of 84 teachers (evenly divided across the RULER and control conditions). We use longitudinal data from across two academic years of intervention, controlling for perceptions and outcomes during the academic year prior to the intervention. In our analyses, a teacher perception of school climate is a composite score comprised of four scales: Support for Instructional Improvement, Staff Collegiality, Administrative Leadership and Administrator Support. For teacher stress and burn out, we examined two sub scales, Emotional Exhaustion and Personal Accomplishment, each of which was modeled separately as an outcome in the path analyses. We estimated multigroup (control v. RULER) path models using LISREL 9.10 and model fit was examined using multiple indices, including the root mean square error of approximations (RMSEA, values of <.06) along with the change in chi square across varying nested model.

Results suggest teachers participating in the RULER program had increased perceptions of school climate, decreased emotional exhaustion and increased personal accomplishment at the end of the two-year intervention period. The discussion focuses on the potential for school-level interventions to impact individual teacher outcomes.