The ethnic classroom composition and classmates' ethnic attitudes can affect how students experience their classroom social environment (CSE). Following the imbalance of power thesis and prior research on ethnic attitudes, this cross-sectional study examined if ethnic classroom composition (i.e., proportion of in-group and Herfindahl Index) and…

Background: The transition from primary to secondary education can be difficult for children. This paper reports on an intervention in the Netherlands known as the Talent Classrooms (TC), which aimed to support students' primary-secondary school transition. The goal of TC was to increase the match between the personal environment of the student…

Background: This study evaluated the effect of the school-based intervention Charge Your Brainzzz on adolescents' social-cognitive determinants, sleep hygiene and sleep duration and quality. Methods: A cluster-randomized controlled trial was conducted with 972 students from 10 Dutch high schools. Schools were randomly allocated to the intervention…

The present study aimed to identify overall stress and salient stressors experienced by adolescents from different education tracks and self-perceived ethnic backgrounds. A total of 1489 adolescents (M = 13.40 years; SD = 0.89 years) from nine Dutch secondary schools participated. Self-reported stressors were measured with the adapted version of…

The abilities of citizens to make themselves heard and listen to each other are essential for the functioning of democratic societies. Schools are practice grounds for these citizenship competences. This study investigates whether students' experiences with voice in school are related to their attitudes towards voice (contributing and listening…

Learning environment designs at the boundary of school and work can be characterised as integrative because they integrate features from the contexts of school and work. Many different manifestations of such integrative learning environments are found in current vocational education, both in senior secondary education and higher professional…

Purpose: Despite their pivotal role in classroom social dynamics, teachers are not always aware of, and/or do not know how to respond to, bottlenecks in these dynamics. This study investigated the effectiveness of the Social Classroom Dynamics Intervention with Lesson Study (SKILS, acronym of the Dutch program name) in supporting teachers with…

The goal of the study was to deliver and validate a new solution-focused instrument, the Focus Skills Questionnaire (FSQ), to assess the degree of executive functioning skills in the school context, for three different education levels (elementary, secondary, and tertiary education) and informant groups (students, teachers and parents) on a sample…

There is increasing attention for interest as a powerful, complex, and integrative construct, ranging in appearance from entirely momentary states of interest to longer-term interest pursuits. Developmental models have shown how these situational interests can develop into individual interests over time. As such, these models have helped to…

Student--teacher gender congruence is suggested to be related to increased student performance, but little is known about the contexts in which these effects occur. Based on literature on gender stereotypes this study hypothesizes different effects of student-teacher gender congruence for male and female students across school subjects and in…

School absenteeism is a major societal problem, with a range of potential adverse long-term consequences. This scoping review aimed to provide a comprehensive overview of the research on school absenteeism in autistic children and adolescents, expose important gaps in the literature, and explore possibilities for future systematic reviews. Five…

Autonomy-supportive activities are understood to promote students' autonomous forms of learning motivation, educational outcomes and well-being. In the current study, two learning labs in one Dutch secondary school have been studied. In these learning labs--each lasting one entire school year--students' autonomy during their learning process have…

The goal of this article is to understand how the pro-environmental behaviour (PEB) of secondary school students can be encouraged. In an exploratory study, we examine to what extent pro-environmental cues--that is, 'situational strength' (Mischel, Psychological Review, 80(4):252, 1973)--were present in schools and whether students in 'stronger'…

Omer's concept of 'New Authority' wants to avoid both the use of power and the harms of a permissive climate. 'New Authority' fosters good relationships with the child and operates in a network of educators with similar values. In the participative action research described in this article, I focus on the question of whether I could include…

This study focuses on the school-work connection from the perspective of curriculum design. The aim was to uncover considerations underpinning the design of learning environments in vocational education. The research took place in the Netherlands. A focus group methodology was chosen to elicit designers' considerations, which generally remain…