| Based on data from the National Center for Education Statistics, the public school student population is becoming more diverse (2003, 2011). As a result of this, pre-service teachers need to be culturally competent so they can meet the unique needs of the diverse student body they will be teaching. This quantitative study offers a preliminary examination into the creation of an instrument, the Multicultural Awareness, Skills, and Knowledge Survey (MASKS), used to measure the cultural competency of pre-service teachers. This investigation follows clearly defined steps to create the survey, a review of the pilot by both experts in the field and pre-service teachers, and a final field test of the instrument with a larger population of pre-service teachers.;The results of the MASKS field test yielded 446 usable responses. Exploratory factor analysis was used to narrow the number of survey items and determine internal validity, whereas Chronbach's alpha was used to determine reliability. The outcome of this study is a valid and reliable survey instrument which can be used to measure the cultural competency of pre-service teachers. |
