The Classroom Community Scale in face-to-face university context: Factorial structure and convergent/divergent validity

The Sense of Community (SC) in the university context relates to academic achievement, social par-ticipation, and well-being. One of the most common tools to measure student SC in the university context is the Classroom Community Scale (CCS), consisting of two subscales: Connectedness and Learning. This 2-factor structure has not been confirmed in face-to-face courses yet. The present investigation was aimed to verify its factorial structure and convergent/divergent validity in face-to-face university courses. The original 2-factor structure was partially confirmed via the explorative structural equation model with the data collected from 420 university students. The two resulting factors had internal consistency. More-over, they showed good convergent/divergent validity in relation to a different scale of SC and a scale of perceived social support ‒‒ a construct similar to, but distinct from, SC ‒‒ investigated in a group of 175 students. The CCS is an efficient tool for designing, monitoring, and evaluating face-to-face university courses.