SELweb Middle School Overview
SELweb MS assessment and study info
SELweb Middle School (SELweb MS): A web-based assessment of social-emotional competencies currently being developed for middle school (grades 6–8).
What it Measures:
Self-Awareness (understanding one’s own emotions, including causes and physical experiences)
Self-Management (managing feelings, including coping with challenging situations and emotions)
Social Awareness (understanding others’ feelings and perspectives)
Relationship Skills (managing challenging situations, e.g. interpersonal conflict and peer pressure)
Responsible Decision-Making (how to stay organized and manage time well)
Types of Questions:
Factual questions—knowledge-based questions
“When someone feels upset, which of the following actions can help them feel better?”
Situational judgment tasks—application of skills
“Imagine you and a classmate disagreed about how to do a group project…”
Self-report—student perceptions of their own skills
“I know how to calm down when something upsetting happens.”
School-Based Use of SELweb MS
School districts are invited to administer SELweb MS to their 6th-8th grade students free of charge for their instructional and evaluation purposes. This includes training and support from Rush, as well as the provision of standardized score reports. In exchange, schools will share the deidentified responses with the Rush research team, along with student demographic information like gender, ethnicity, and grade. Data will be used to evaluate the validity of SELweb MS.
Home-Based Validation Study
Overview: Students in 6th-8th grade are invited to participate in a validation study in which they will complete alternate SEL measures and teachers will complete rating scales. Data will be used to evaluate the validity of SELweb MS.
Testing: Parents must sign a consent form before students can participate. Participation in the validation study involves a one-on-one meeting between a member of the Rush research team and the student, either in person or over Zoom. Assent will be obtained from the student before testing starts. Testing will include questions about emotional awareness, subtests from SELweb Late Elementary, items from the Behavior Rating Inventory of Executive Functioning, and a vocabulary task from the WISC-IV. If students are completing SELweb MS separately at school, we anticipate validation meetings to be roughly one hour, and each student will receive a $15 gift card for participating. Teachers will separately complete items from the Academic Competence Evaluation Scales and the Social Skills Improvement System. Teachers will receive a gift card as appreciation for their time.