Student Risk Screening Scale (SRSS)

What is “student risk?”

When we speak of “” or “student at risk,” we speak of students who are at risk of encountering problems that impact their mental well-being and capability to accomplish academic requirements and succeed in their education.

For educators handling students at risk, it’s important to focus on the different factors that may be contributing to their problems. Examples of factors include problems within their academic journey, like having learning disabilities or developmental disorders, having low test or assignment scores, having minimal or no academic achievement, or limited access to educational materials.

Factors can also cover the social life of the student, like if they are feeling pressure from their family or peers, if they’re supported by their family and friends, if they have friends, and/or if they are being bullied.

Their mental health should also be looked into because educators might be handling kids with anxiety, depression, or traumatic experiences that are weighing on them.

By focusing on these factors, educators will have the chance to come up with ways to help students work through their problems and have fruitful academic journeys.

How to use the Student Risk Screening Scale (SRSS)

One way to gauge how at-risk a student is is to use assessments such as the Student Risk Screening Scale, or the SRSS for short. This is an easy-to-use assessment that’s often paired with another assessment called the Student Internalizing Behavior Screening Scale (SIBSS), which we also have a guide for.

The Student Risk Screening Scale focuses on gauging a student’s externalizing behaviors. Here are the things they have to look into:

• Steal
• Lie, cheat, sneak
• Behavior problems
• Peer rejection
• Low academic achievement
• Negative attitude
• Aggressive behavior

Educators or school counselors using this scale will simply have to rate each item with one of the following:

• 0 = Never
• 1 = Occasionally
• 2 = Sometimes
• 3 = Frequently

After rating each item, you just need to add up the scores. To interpret the findings of this scale, just refer to these score ranges and designations:

• 0 to 3 = Low risk
• 4 to 8 = Moderate risk
• 9 to 21 = High Risk

The Student Risk Screening Scale’s results are insufficient to determine what you must do for a student. It’s best to use other assessments like the Student Internalizing Behavior Screening Scale (SIBSS) and other school-related data associated with the student, like their scores for their subjects, if they’ve had discipline referrals or detention, the number of absences they’ve had and the reasons why they were absent, etc. Whatever interventions you need to implement will depend on the overall results and what the student’s key areas of concern are.

Student Risk Screening Scale (SRSS) Example

Now you know the basic gist of student risk, what the student risk screening scale is, what it tries to measure, how it’s scored, and how the results are interpreted, it’s time for you to see what it looks like.

The template we have replicates the original scale. We added radio buttons for you to select a rating. You can do so by ticking the buttons with a pen (if you’re using a physical copy) or by clicking on it if you’re using a digital copy.

We also added an additional comments box in case you have observations worth noting. Your notes might help with formulating an intervention plan for the student once you have all the other data you need.

If you like what you see and believe it’ll help you assess the students of your school, feel free to download our free Student Risk Screening Scale PDF template!

Download this Student Risk Screening Scale (SRSS) Example:

When is it best to use the Student Risk Screening Scale (SRSS)?

The Student Risk Screening Scale (SRSS) was designed to be used twice a year, so if you’re an educator or a school counselor, it’s best to use this scale once per semester so you can track the changes between them. Please note that if you’re going to use this scale, you need to do so with the mindset that you’re not isolating a student or excluding them from anything related to their school work and life. You need to approach it in a way that determines what support you can provide based on the results of this scale, other assessments, and their data (such as test scores, detention records, absence records, etc.).

The scale shouldn’t be used to label students or designate them as a student with special needs requiring special education. It’s also not used as an assessment of a student’s personality traits. Again, the use of the Student Risk Screening Scale is to determine critical areas of concern that may negatively impact a student’s academic journey. This should aid in determining how educators and the school can help create an environment that’s safe for the student where they can learn in peace. It should aid in helping educators determine what resources to allocate so that the student has an equal shot at achieving academic excellence like everyone else and can graduate on time.

What are the benefits of using the Student Risk Screening Scale (SRSS)?

It can help determine the factors that are negatively affecting a student’s academic journey.

The Student Risk Screening Scale (SRSS) was designed to look at the externalizing behaviors that certain students might have. By taking note of the seven items on the scale’s list, educators can make observations if these externalizing behaviors should be considered as key areas of concern. The additional comments box we added to the scale will give them the opportunity to elaborate on their observations of each student.

It pairs well with the Student Internalizing Behavior Screening Scale (SIBSS).

More often than not, the Student Risk Screening Scale is paired with the Student Internalizing Behavior Screening Scale because doing so can give a comprehensive look at a student. Educators who use both of these will be able to cover both externalizing and internalizing behaviors. The results can be combined along with other school data related to the student that educators or school counselors are assessing. Doing so will help them determine the appropriate interventions and support to provide for the student so they can have a better school life and fruitful academic journey.

It can be used to monitor students over time to track their progress.

The Student Risk Screening Scale was designed to be used twice a year. Given this, you can consider it both a screening tool and a monitoring tool. Let’s say that you created an intervention and support plan for the student, implemented it, and the student has been following this plan for a while. When the next semester starts, or when you’re in the middle of it, you can use the Student Risk Screening Scale to check for any changes to their externalizing behaviors. If there are, and they are scoring lower, that means they are improving! If not, then you might want to make tweaks to your intervention and support plan.

How can Carepatron help with school counseling and student therapy-related work?

If you’re an educator, a school counselor, or a similar professional who normally handles students, we hope that this mini-guide was a good introduction or refresher to the Student Risk Screening Scale (SRSS). We also hope that the template helps you gauge students who are struggling with their academic life.

While we have you here, we’d like to ask you for your time to check out more of our platform. We have something cool in store for you! Yes, if you check out our platform, you will see that this is for healthcare professionals, so you will probably ask, “How can educators benefit from this?” The answer to that is we have numerous assessments that you can use to gauge your students for particular problems. The Student Risk Screening Scale is one of them. We even have a template for the Student Internalizing Behavior Screening Scale we mentioned earlier. We also have other assessments that can assess them for anxiety, depression, or some other mental health problem that might be a key area of concern.

We also have worksheets that might be useful to you! The worksheets are mostly for mental health therapy, but if you have employees in your school who happen to be experts in therapy, then you can have them use these worksheets to get to know students better. The way they grapple with these worksheets might shed light on other key areas of concern that might affect their respective academic journeys.

The best part about these resources is that they’re all free! So, download as much as you want and need!