Psychometric properties of the questionnaire for educational justice assessment-student perspective (QEJA-SP) as a reliable tool to inform managers about students' perceptions.

BACKGROUND

Assessing educational justice (EJ) and its observance has been documented among the main goals in education systems, but no proper tools have been thus far developed to act in this way. Against this background, the present study was to design a questionnaire to assess EJ from the perspective of students and then evaluate its psychometric properties.

METHODS

The Questionnaire for Educational Justice Assessment: Student Perspective (QEJA-SP) contained 42 items, constructed by reviewing the related literature and interviews. To determine the sample size, a 5:1 ratio was further considered. Given that 210 questionnaires were required, 231 cases were distributed among the participants in consideration of their dropout. During data analysis, 17 questionnaires were also excluded due to their incompleteness. To measure the validity of the tool of interest, qualitative and quantitative face validity and content validity, viz., content validity index (CVI) and content validity ratio (CVR), were utilized. Construct validity was then evaluated using exploratory factor analysis (EFA) and Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA).Upon confirming the validity, intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC) and internal consistency were applied, using Cronbach's alpha, in order to establish the reliability of the questionnaire.

RESULTS

The CVR and CVI values were found to be greater than 0.62 and 0.7, respectively. As well, the EFA resulted in a model with the total variance explained (TVE) of 69.144. CFA significantly demonstrated the validity and accuracy of the tool's results, providing further confidence in its accuracy and effectiveness.The Cronbach's alpha and test-retest reliability values of the entire questionnaire were equal to 0.946 and 0.956, in that order. The final questionnaire, the QEJA-SP, accordingly comprised of 36 items and eight dimensions, including "justice in research" with the highest TVE = 15.157% and "classroom capacity" with the lowest value = 3.924%.

CONCLUSION

With regard to the acceptable psychometric properties of the QEJA-SP, fitting the academic environments and the target population of students, this tool could help education managers and policymakers at universities and institutes of higher education (IHEs) to learn about students' expectations and perceptions, and then evaluate the existing situation in their affiliated centers in terms of EJ fulfillment.