Administrators’ and Teachers’ Views on School Culture: A Qualitative Study

Abstract

The purpose of this qualitative research is to explore the primary and secondary school administrators’
and teachers’ views on school culture. The research data was collected trough semi-structured interviews with 8
administrators and 16 teachers working in four different schools in Malatya province, during 2007-2008 spring
semester. The audio-recorded data obtained were analysed through content analysis technique and the results were
presented descriptively. Results showed that participants, in general, stress the quality of the human relations and some
positive organizational attributes such as openness to change and justice in organizational process when describing
culture of their school. Contrary to these positive views, a school administrator complained that school culture is
adversely affected by temporarily assigned teachers (who are permanent staff in one school and concurrently work in
other), i.e. poor adaptation to the school. Participants were also asked to indicate values shared by school community.
Results showed that confidence and collaboration have been the values mostly stated by the participants. And also
participants have stated that shared values are transmitted through organizational communication and organizational
socialization processes. Besides results showed that participants have positive feelings regarding ceremonial activities,
while some participants, especially administrators, complain about some challenges (i.e. physical facilities and budget)
that hinder doing these activities