This paper aims to analyze the contribution that school self-evaluation can provide for improving the quality of education, through a system of areas and indicators (called SEAIS - Self-Evaluation Areas and Indicators System) able to highlight the strengths and weaknesses of schools. In this way schools can consciously take on raising the quality of their actions and constantly monitor the results achieved. The recognition of school autonomy in strategic sectors such as didactics, organization and curriculum innovation, occurred in most European countries in the 1980s, has generated two consequences which need to be considered: 1) the extension of decision-making powers and areas of flexibility available to each school as regards the design of training offer; 2) a strengthening of the responsibilities required of teachers and school leaders in parent and student educational needs' satisfaction (Woessmann, Luedemann, Schuetz and West, 2009). Today, schools are called to “account” for their policies, actions and educational organization in relation to the social context in which they operate and the education system they belong to.

In Italy, the self-evaluation of schools has assumed great importance as a result of the enactment of the new Regulation on National School Evaluation System (Decree n. 80/2013). This Regulation states the importance of the relationship between external evaluation and self-evaluation, creating a strong relationship between evaluation and improvement. The new National School Evaluation System is structured, in four phases: 1) self-assessment; 2) external evaluation; 3) design and implementation of improvement plans; 4) social accountability.

As accurred in other European countries, in this System, self-evaluation is intended as a continuous analysis process of school practices and activities, and it is the first stage of an integrated evaluation for improvement, capable of analyzing some processes, such as those ones at class level, which are more difficult to detect with external evaluation. In this system, external evaluation and the identification of criteria and tools for self-evaluation are used primarily to guide each school towards a systemic perspective of internal organization analysis, which is useful to recognize the essential components and mutual external-internal relations, as well as to read the individual case in comparison to others (Barzanò, 2002). Self-evaluation is, therefore, the starting point for a multi-year process of analysis within-school that needs a rigorous evidence-based methodology together with qualitative/quantitative tools of detection/measurement, which can provide reliable information on the processes in place as well as the results obtained (Coe, 2002).

This research intends to present a specific model of self-evaluation, called ISSEMod (Integrated School Self-Evaluation Model),  that each school can adopt and adapt to its own context, and that can enrich the basic model established at national or local  level. The model in question is based on a system of areas and indicators through which schools can observe themselves and compare their results (organization, management, teaching resources, learning outcomes, etc.) with those of other schools that have the same socio-economic and family background. The theoretical framework of this research considers schools as "learning organizations" (Argyris and Schon, 1978), and it is integrated with the latest researches on school quality indicators conducted by the OECD (2014). According to these approaches and researches, self-evaluation is perceived as a means to investigate the “overall health of schools”. Therefore, it is not limited only to monitor the outcomes of learning, but reflects on the ways of being of a school as a complex organization which is part of a broader context of external relations, by paying attention to the results achieved compared to targets set, and taking into account the resources available (Blok, Sleegers and Karsten, 2008).

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