The Organizational Climate Description Questionnaire for Revised Elementary Schools (OCDQ-RE)

Abstract

The Organizational Climate Description for Elementary Schools (OCDQ-RE) is a widely utilized instrument designed to measure the organizational climate within elementary school settings. Developed by Hoy, Tarter, and Kottkamp, this 42-item scale provides a comprehensive framework for assessing the quality of social interactions, professional relationships, and administrative behaviors that characterize a school’s internal environment. The OCDQ-RE classifies the climate along six distinct dimensions, three focusing on the principal’s leadership style and three focusing on the faculty’s collegial dynamics. The instrument is instrumental in diagnosing organizational health and guiding interventions aimed at fostering more effective educational environments.

Keywords

Organizational Climate, School Climate, Elementary Schools, Teacher Behavior, Principal Behavior, Supportive, Collegial, Restrictive, Disengaged, Hoy, Tarter, Kottkamp.

Authors

Wayne K. Hoy, C. John Tarter, Robert B. Kottkamp

Purpose

The primary purpose of the OCDQ-RE is to provide researchers and practitioners with a standardized, reliable tool for diagnosing the organizational climate of elementary schools. By quantifying perceptions of both administrative and faculty interactions, the instrument helps identify specific areas of strength and weakness within the school environment, allowing for a detailed profile of the school’s atmosphere.

The results derived from the OCDQ-RE are often used as a basis for organizational development and intervention strategies aimed at fostering an “Open” or “Healthy” school climate. Such climates are hypothesized to positively influence teacher morale, professional efficacy, and ultimately, student achievement, aligning with the authors’ broader research on school health.

Construct

The OCDQ-RE measures the organizational climate through six specific dimensions, which are grouped into two main categories: Principal’s Behavior and Teacher’s Behavior. These dimensions capture the complexity of the school environment by assessing both vertical (administrator-teacher) and horizontal (teacher-teacher) relationships.

• Principal’s Behavior Dimensions:
  • Supportive Behavior (S): Reflects the principal’s genuine concern for the welfare of teachers, characterized by helpfulness, encouragement, and constructive criticism.
  • Directive Behavior (D): Measures the principal’s rigid, close supervision, often characterized by strict rule enforcement, monitoring of activities, and autocratic decision-making.
  • Restrictive Behavior (R): Pertains to organizational constraints that hinder teachers’ professional activities, such as excessive paperwork, routine duties, and administrative burdens.
• Teacher’s Behavior Dimensions:
  • Collegial Behavior (C): Describes the friendly and professional interactions among teachers, focusing on mutual respect, cooperation, and job accomplishment.
  • Intimate Behavior (Int): Reflects the extent of close, personal friendships among faculty members, including socializing outside of professional requirements.
  • Disengaged Behavior (Dis): Characterized by a lack of commitment, apathy, and disruptive behavior among faculty, such as useless meetings or exerting group pressure on non-conforming members.

Validity

The structural integrity of the OCDQ-RE is supported by evidence of construct validity, demonstrating that the six factors align theoretically with established models of organizational theory and educational leadership. The initial development of the scale involved rigorous item selection and refinement to ensure that each item accurately represents its intended dimension.

The scale’s ability to successfully differentiate between schools exhibiting different types of climates (e.g., “open,” “closed,” or “healthy” climates) provides crucial support for its predictive utility. The clear distinction between administrative and faculty factors also confirms the scale’s internal structure validity, ensuring that the instrument measures distinct components of the school environment.

Reliability

The OCDQ-RE demonstrates strong internal consistency, confirming high reliability across its six subscales, typically measured using Cronbach’s alpha coefficients. The reliability estimates provided in the source material are highly acceptable for psychological instruments, indicating that the items within each subscale consistently measure the same underlying construct:

• Supportive Behavior (S): 0.94
• Directive Behavior (D): 0.88
• Restrictive Behavior (R): 0.81
• Collegial Behavior (C): 0.87
• Intimate Behavior (Int): 0.83
• Disengaged Behavior (Dis): 0.78

These high coefficients assure researchers of the internal consistency and stability of the scores derived from the OCDQ-RE, making it a trustworthy measure for assessing school climate.

Factor Analysis

The structure of the OCDQ-RE is derived from extensive factor analysis, which confirmed a robust six-factor model. This analysis successfully separated the variance attributed to the principal’s leadership behaviors from the variance associated with the teachers’ professional and social interactions.

The resulting structure maintains a clear delineation between the three administrative dimensions (Supportive, Directive, Restrictive) and the three faculty dimensions (Collegial, Intimate, Disengaged). This factorial clarity allows for nuanced analysis of how different aspects of leadership and faculty relationships contribute independently to the overall organizational climate.

Instrument

Test Type: Self-report questionnaire / Organizational assessment scale

Format: 42 items scored on a 4-point Likert scale, where 1=”rarely occurs,” 2=”sometimes occurs,” 3=”often occurs,” and 4=”very frequently occurs.”

Language Available: Primarily English (original version).

Population Group: Educational professionals (Teachers).

Age Group: Adults.

Population Details: Elementary school faculty members (K-6 or equivalent grades) who provide their perceptions of the school climate.

Test Methodology: Respondents rate the frequency of specific principal and teacher behaviors. Scoring involves summing item responses for each of the six dimensions, with items 6, 31, and 37 requiring reverse scoring before summation. The specific scoring formulas are provided to isolate each factor (e.g., Supportive Behavior (S)=4+9+15+16+22+23+28+29+42).

Keywords

School administration, Educational psychology, Organizational development, Teacher morale, Principal leadership, Psychometrics, OCDQ-RE, Educational research.

Authors

Author ORCID Identifier: N/A (Researchers should consult current academic databases for updated ORCID information for Hoy, Tarter, and Kottkamp.)

Affiliation Email addresses: N/A

Correspondence Address: N/A

Permissions & Fee and Test Year

The original structure and validation of the OCDQ-RE were primarily established through foundational research published in 1991 (Hoy, Tarter, & Kottkamp). The scale is widely used in academic and non-commercial research; however, formal usage may require permission from the authors or copyright holders.

The original PDF of the instrument and scoring guide can be downloaded here: http://www.waynekhoy.com/pdfs/ocdq-re.pdf

Reference’s

• Hoy‚ W. K.‚ Tarter‚ C. J.‚ & Kottkamp‚ R. B. (1991). Open schools/healthy schools: Measuring organizational climate. Beverly Hills‚ CA: Sage.
• Hoy‚ W. K.‚ & Tarter‚ C. J. (1997). The road to open and healthy schools: A handbook for change‚ Elementary Edition. Thousand Oaks‚ CA: Corwin Press.
• Additional resources are available at the author’s academic site: http://www.waynekhoy.com

Items of the THE Organizational Climate Description for Elementary Schools (OCDQ-RE)

IMPORTANT: The following scale items must be preserved in their original language and must not be changed in any way.

1. The teachers accomplish their work with vim‚ vigor‚ and pleasure.
2. Teachers’ closest friends are other faculty members at this school.
3. Faculty meetings are useless.
4. The principal goes out of his/her way to help teachers.
5. The principal rules with an iron fist.
6. Teachers leave school immediately after school is over.
7. Teachers invite faculty members to visit them at home.
8. There is a minority group of teachers who always oppose the majority.
9. The principal uses constructive criticism.
10. The principal checks the sign-in sheet every morning.
11. Routine duties interfere with the job of teaching.
12. Most of the teachers here accept the faults of their colleagues.
13. Teachers know the family background of other faculty members.
14. Teachers exert group pressure on non-conforming faculty members.
15. The principal explains his/her reasons for criticism to teachers.
16. The principal listens to and accepts teachers’ suggestions.
17. The principal schedules the work for the teachers.
18. Teachers have too many committee requirements.
19. Teachers help and support each other.
20. Teachers have fun socializing together during school time.
21. Teachers ramble when they talk at faculty meetings.
22. The principal looks out for the personal welfare of teachers.
23. The principal treats teachers as equals.
24. The principal corrects teachers’ mistakes.
25. Administrative paperwork is burdensome at this school.
26. Teachers are proud of their school.
27. Teachers have parties for each other.
28. The principal compliments teachers.
29. The principal is easy to understand.
30. The principal closely checks classroom (teacher) activities.
31. Clerical support reduces teachers’ paperwork.
32. New teachers are readily accepted by colleagues.
33. Teachers socialize with each other on a regular basis.
34. The principal supervises t3eachers closely.
35. The principal checks lesson plans.
36. Teachers are burdened with busy work.
37. Teachers socialize together in small‚ se‎lect groups.
38. Teachers provide strong social support for colleagues.
39. The principal is autocratic.
40. Teachers respect the professional competence of their colleagues.
41. The principal monitors everything teachers do.
42. The principal goes out of his/her way to show appreciation to teachers.

Scoring Information:

Response Scale: 1=”rarely occurs”‚ 2=”sometimes occurs”‚ 3=”often occurs”‚ and 4=”very frequently occurs.”

Reverse score items: 6‚ 31‚ 37

• Supportive Behavior (S) = 4+9+15+16+22+23+28+29+42
• Directive Behavior (D) = 5+10+17+24+30+34+35+39+41
• Restrictive Behavior (R) = 11+18+25+31+36
• Collegial Behavior (C) = 1+6+12+19+26+32+37+40
• Intimate Behavior (Int) = 2+7+13+20+27+33+38
• Disengaged Behavior (Dis) = 3+8+14+21