Assessments / Other Assessments
SDQ Screening
How to Import Your Data
The SDQ is not administered in Standard Education. Your staff, students, or families complete the questionnaire however your district runs it, and you send us the responses in the SDQ results template.
Start from the template: SDQ Results Template.xlsx. The first tab of the workbook explains how to fill it in, and the Field Guide and Valid Values tabs document every column.
Filling In the Template
- Type only on the SDQ Responses tab, in the rows under the headers.
- Enter one row for each completed questionnaire. A student who completes the SDQ twice in a year gets two rows.
- Fill in every required column. Required headers are dark blue, optional headers are gray, and the 25 answer headers are teal.
- Enter each answer exactly as it was marked, using the drop-down:
Not True,Somewhat True, orCertainly True. - Leave an answer blank only if the item was genuinely skipped.
- Use the student's district student number — the same one in your student information system.
- Enter dates as
MM/DD/YYYYwith a four-digit year, for example10/14/2026. - Don't rename, reorder, or delete columns, and don't add new ones.
- Save the file as
.xlsx, then send it to us through the File Uploader (see Sending the File below).
Don't score the answers yourself
Send the raw responses only. Standard Education calculates the subscale and total difficulties scores. Pre-scored or summed values can't be loaded, and a row with a skipped item can't be fully scored — so check forms for missed items before you enter them.
Required Columns
| Column | What to enter | Format or allowed values |
|---|---|---|
| School Year | The school year the questionnaire was given | One of: 2025-26, 2026-27, 2027-28 |
| Date Completed | The date the questionnaire was completed | MM/DD/YYYY, four-digit year |
| Respondent | Who filled in the questionnaire | One of: Student, Teacher, Parent |
| Student ID | The student's district student number | Digits only, 4 to 10 digits |
| Student Name | The student's name, used to double-check the student ID | Last, First |
| School | The school the student attends, using its full name | Free text. Spell each school the same way on every row |
| Grade | The student's grade when the questionnaire was given | Kindergarten, 1st Grade, 2nd Grade … 12th Grade |
Respondent set to Student means the student's own self-report.
Optional Columns
| Column | What to enter | Format or allowed values |
|---|---|---|
| Birth Date | The student's date of birth | MM/DD/YYYY, four-digit year |
| Gender | The student's gender | One of: Female, Male, Other, I prefer not to say |
| Race | The student's race | One of: American Indian or Alaskan Native, Asian, Black or African American, Multi-race, Native Hawaiian or Other Pacific Islander, White |
| Ethnicity | The student's ethnicity | One of: Hispanic, Non-Hispanic |
Students with these fields left blank still get results, but they show as blank in dashboard breakdowns by gender, race, or ethnicity.
Answer Columns
The 25 answer columns sit to the right of the demographic columns, in the same order as the items on the SDQ form. The first answer column (Nice Feelings) is item 1 and the last (Attention) is item 25:
| Item | Column | Item | Column |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Nice Feelings | 14 | Generally Like |
| 2 | Restless | 15 | Distracted |
| 3 | Headaches | 16 | Nervous |
| 4 | Usually Share | 17 | Kind Younger Children |
| 5 | Angry Temper | 18 | Lying Cheating |
| 6 | Alone | 19 | Bully |
| 7 | Do As Told | 20 | Help Others |
| 8 | Worry | 21 | Think Before Do |
| 9 | Helpful | 22 | Take Things |
| 10 | Squirming | 23 | Get Along |
| 11 | Good Friend | 24 | Fears Scared |
| 12 | Fight | 25 | Attention |
| 13 | Unhappy Fearful |
Each answer column takes Not True, Somewhat True, or Certainly True, and is required unless the item was skipped.
Built-In Checks
The workbook highlights two problems as you type, so you can fix them before sending:
- Missing — a required value is missing on a row you've started.
- Repeated — the same student, date, and respondent appear on more than one row.
Sending the File
Upload the workbook through the File Uploader in the portal:
- Log in to portal.standardeducation.com.
- Select File Uploader.
- Choose the workbook and click Upload.
Use the File Uploader, not email
A completed SDQ template contains student-identifying information. Upload it through the File Uploader rather than attaching it to an email or sharing it from a personal file-sharing account.
Send the workbook as the Excel file — don't convert it to CSV or PDF, and don't send only a printed copy. If you have questions about a column, contact your Standard Education team.
Overview
The SDQ (Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire) is a brief behavioral screening questionnaire for children and young people. It is a published instrument, not built by Standard Education, and it is widely used as a universal screener alongside tools like the SRSS.
The questionnaire has 25 items. Each is rated Not True, Somewhat True, or Certainly True, and the same 25 items are used across the student self-report, teacher, and parent versions. Standard Education accepts all three respondent types in the same file.
What It Measures
The 25 items divide into five scales of five items each:
| Scale | What it covers |
|---|---|
| Emotional symptoms | Worry, unhappiness, fears, nervousness, physical complaints |
| Conduct problems | Temper, fighting, lying, taking things, not doing as told |
| Hyperactivity / inattention | Restlessness, squirming, distraction, acting without thinking |
| Peer relationship problems | Being alone, friendships, getting along with peers, being bullied |
| Prosocial behavior | Sharing, helpfulness, kindness, consideration of others' feelings |
The first four scales combine into a total difficulties score. Prosocial behavior is scored separately and is a strengths measure — a higher prosocial score is a better result, which is the reverse of the other four scales.
Screening is not diagnosis
As with every screener in Standard Education, an elevated SDQ score flags a student who may benefit from a closer look. It is not a diagnosis and should be interpreted alongside attendance, behavior, and other screening data.
Scoring
Standard Education scores the file after you send it. You send the raw Not True / Somewhat True / Certainly True answers; we convert them to item scores, reverse-score the items that need it, and calculate the five scale scores and the total difficulties score.
Because scoring happens on our side, the same banding is applied consistently across every school in your district and across school years.
Where Results Appear
SDQ results appear on your district's SDQ dashboard once we've loaded your file.
Each completed questionnaire is stored as its own record, with its School Year, Date Completed, and Respondent. A second screening of the same student, or a teacher or parent report, is added alongside the earlier ones rather than replacing them.
Notes and Limitations
- The SDQ is a third-party instrument. Standard Education stores, scores, and reports the results but does not administer the questionnaire.
- Not all districts use the SDQ. These views only appear if your district sends SDQ data.
- Results are only as current as your most recent file. There is no automated feed for SDQ data — each administration is sent as a completed template.
- A questionnaire with skipped items cannot be fully scored. Check forms for missed items before entering them.
- Keep school names spelled consistently between administrations. "Lincoln ES" and "Lincoln Elementary" will be treated as two different schools in your dashboards.