Green Schoolyard Site Selection Tool.xlsx

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2	ABOUT THIS TOOL
3	This Green Schoolyard Site Selection Tool can assist school districts, cities, and their partners in applying an equity lens to site selection as they roll out a districtwide, open-access green schoolyard program. It was developed drawing upon existing practices and the following, helpful examples: ---Minnesota School Survey, developed by Trust for Public Land ---Space to Grow: Greening Chicago Schoolyards' site selection criteria (Chicago) ---St. Louis Public Schools Policy Maker Guide to Select Sites for the Green Schoolyard Program, by Rise Community Development, in partnership with The Nature Conservancy and the Missouri Department of Conservation The indicators included in this tool are specifically designed to inform an assessment of need and potential benefit of a green schoolyard transformation. They do not include everything that a team may wish to know about a schoolyard for example, an inventory of available amenities. The tool is customizable and districts should remove indicators that don't bring meaning to a local focus on equity, and add indicators that are missing and locally relevant. There are additional, relevant indicators (such as obesity rates, healthy food access, asthma rates, etc) which would be highly useful, but were not included due to the lack of a national data set that could provide insight at the granular level of individual schools. Inclusion of local data in relevant areas could make strong additions to this template.
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15	HOW TO SELECT SCHOOLS ACCORDING TO EQUITY, USING THIS TOOL
16	STEP 1 Introduction to tool during Green Schoolyards Technical Assistance or assessment team meeting.
17	STEP 2 Full team walks through tool and selects / adds/ defines the indicators most important to use locally.
18	STEP 3 Team / Measurement lead revises tool for local use according to decisions in Step 2.
19	STEP 4 Assign indicators to data collectors: who on the team will be responsible for collecting data for each indicator?
20	STEP 5 Collect data, using this tool to comprehensively assess all district school sites, scoring each one according to the many facets included.
21	STEP 6 Reflect on the data and results, using an equity lens, and with added training on assessing equity if needed.
22	STEP 7 Invite the highest-scoring (and thus equitably prioritized) sites to apply, incorporating more qualitative factors such as community, school leadership, and PTO/PTA support.
23	TABLE OF CONTENTS
24	Tab 1	ABOUT THIS TOOL	Describes purpose of the tool, source examples, and best use.
25	Tab 2	INDICATORS	Provides the name and description of each indicator, along with which category it addresses.
26	Tab 3	SITE SCORE SHEET	A customizable space to score each schoolyard site according to a comprehensive set of indicators, along with a scoring guide for each.