Advances in children’s rights and children’s well-being measurement: Implications for school psychologists.

Abstract

Recent years have brought important changes to the profession of school psychology, influenced by larger social, scientific, and political trends. These trends include the emergence of children's rights agenda and advances in children's well-being measurement. During these years, a growing public attention and commitment to the notion of children's rights has developed, which is best expressed in the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child. The Convention outlines the conditions necessary to ensure and promote children's well-being and calls for the ongoing monitoring of children's well-being for accountability purposes. We articulate advances in children's rights and children's well-being measurement in the context of children's schooling experiences in general and for school psychology in particular. We highlight implications for the assessment roles of school psychologists, who occupy a unique position at the intersection of multiple subsystems of children's overall ecosystems. We argue that the synergy between a rights-based agenda and advances in children's well-being assessment methodology can provide valuable opportunities for school psychology. This synergy can help school communities establish perspective and goals for children's well-being in rights respecting ways, using the most promising well-being assessment strategies.