What You Need to Know About SEL’s Most Well-Regarded Assessment Suite, the DESSA

The DESSA suite of SEL assessments empowers educators to build a measurable and actionable social and emotional learning (SEL) program with reliable assessment. The DESSA is an empirical, standardized social and emotional competence (SEC) assessment with editions that support students K-12. The DESSA suite complements many different educational models, including MTSS, RTI, PBIS, and Gifted and Talented. It provides a common lens and language for crafting an SEL program that involves educators, parents, and students.

Grounded in resilience theory and directly aligned to the CASEL™ framework, the DESSA is a user-friendly, practical SEC assessment that meets the highest professional standards. The DESSA is commonly used to inform the delivery of SEL at Tier 1 or Tier 2 as well as measuring the results of that delivery. The DESSA suite includes assessments and screeners that adapt to K-8 and 9-12 settings.

The DESSA can be completed by teachers, staff at schools, parents/guardians, and child-serving agencies, including out-of-school time (OST), social service, and mental health programs. The assessment is entirely strength-based; meaning that the items query positive behaviors (e.g., get along with others) rather than maladaptive ones (e.g., annoy others). The same form is used for both parent and teacher raters. For each item, the rater is asked to indicate on a five-point scale how often the student engaged in that behavior over the past four weeks. For students grades 9-12, a self-report is available through Aperture Education’s digital Student Portal.

The DESSA is organized into conceptually derived scales that provide information about eight key social and emotional competencies aligned to CASEL standards. Standard scores can be used to calibrate each child’s competence in each of the eight dimensions and guide school/program-wide, class-wide, and individual strategies to promote those competencies.

Trusted by Johns Hopkins University, American Institutes for Research (AIR), the Rand Corporation, City Year, and the Y of the USA for use in major studies, the DESSA sets the standard for SEL assessment. The DESSA-mini one-minute screener is the only screener to meet the universal criteria set forth by the World Health Organization and predicts social and emotional competence with 95% accuracy. The suite of assessments has supported over 1 million students.

DESSA K-8 SEL Assessments and Screeners

DESSA (K-8)

A teacher rating tool established in over a decade of science and peer-reviewed literature.

  • 72 questions
  • 5-8 minutes to complete
  • 8 competencies aligned to CASEL
  • English and Spanish

DESSA-mini (K-8)

The only social and emotional screener to meet the universal criteria set forth by the World Health Organization.

  • 8 questions
  • 1 minute to complete
  • 4 forms for screening and progress monitoring, 1 form is used per rating period

Aperture has also collaborated with Committee for Children on the DESSA –Second Step Edition and Kickboard on the DESSA SEL Inventory.

DESSA 9-12 SEL Assessments and Screeners

DESSA-High School Edition (DESSA-HSE) (9-12)

A teacher-rating tool to help high school staff and students dig deeper into student strengths and growth opportunities.

  • 43 questions
  • 3-5 minutes to complete

DESSA-High School Edition mini (DESSA-HSE mini) (9-12)

A teacher-rating screening tool to help high school staff quickly identify student strengths and growth opportunities.

  • 8 questions
  • 1 minute to complete

DESSA-Student Self-Report (DESSA-SSR) (9-12)

A student self-rating that delivers real-time results and immediate strategies directly to students to drive change.

  • 55 questions
  • 5-7 minutes to complete
  • Real-time feedback directly to students through the Aperture Student Portal

Learn More About the DESSA