The relationship between the causes of in-class conflicts experience and students at vocational high schools' commitment to their schools

The main purpose of this study is to investigate the relationship between the commitments of students in the vocational and technical high schools to their schools and the reasons of class conflicts. The population of this study was 4070 students studying in nine, eleventh and eleventh grade of eight public Vocational and Technical Anatolian High Schools in Duzce city center in 2017-2018 academic year. The sample is composed of 1039 students studying in nine, eleventh and eleventh grade selected from the research population by stratified sampling method.In order to examine gender, class and field variables of the relationship between vocational and technical Anatolian students' school loyalties and the reasons of class conflicts, the Student's School Engament Scale which was adapted by Önen (2014) and the In-Class Conflict Reasons Scale developed by Argon (2009) . Percentage and frequency analysis for descriptive statistics, t-test for independent groups in comparison with gender variables, one-way ANOVA in comparison with class and field variables, Pearson Moments Product Correlation Coefficient and multiple linear regression analysis techniques were used to predict the causes of class conflicts. It is concluded that students at Vocational and Technical Anatolian high schools' commitment to their school is above the average (I agree). Mental loyalty, future-oriented desires, emotional attachment and parental support respectively have the highest value of loyalty to schools in sub-dimensions. It is found that students at Vocational and Technical Anatolian high schools' awareness about the reasons of experiencing in-class conflicts is not very high(moderate). When the influence of genders on students at Vocational and Technical Anatolian high schools' commitment to schools is scrutinized, it is seen that the points they received from the sub-dimensions of mental loyalty-control of school work, mental loyalty-future-oriented desires and external motivation differ by gender. While average points female students received from the sub-dimensions of mental loyalty-control of school work, mental loyalty-future-oriented desires are statistically higher than male students' average points, the average points male students received from the sub-dimension of mental loyalty-external motivation is higher than female students' average points. When the influence of class level on students at Vocational and Technical Anatolian high schools' commitment to schools is analyzed, there are significant differentiations in the total points, the sub-dimensions of mental loyalty-control of school work, mental loyalty-student-teacher relationships, emotional attachment-peer support and external motivation. When the effects of gender in the opinions of students at Vocational and Technical Anatolian high schools about the causes of conflict within the class are examined, it is obvious that the points they received from the sub-dimensions of teachers' not valuing students, teachers' learning-teaching environmental skills, teachers' communication skills, teachers' unjust attitudes, teachers' biased behaviors, teachers' behavior of complying with the school rules, student behaviors and the sum of the scale statistically differ by gender. It is seen that the opinions of students at Vocational and Technical Anatolian high schools about the causes of in-classroom conflicts are not statistically different according to their class levels. When the effect of fields in the opinions of students at Vocational and Technical Anatolian high schools about the reasons of in-class conflicts is examined, differentiations are statistically obvious in the sub-dimensions of teachers' biased attitudes, student behaviors, teachers' not caring about students, the behavior of teachers to follow class rules, teachers' learning-teaching environmental skills, student personality traits, teachers' communication skills and teachers' unjust behaviors. There is a significant negative correlation between school commitments of students at Vocational and Technical Anatolian high schools and causes of conflicts in classrooms. The sub-dimensions of control of school work, student-teacher relationship, future-oriented desires and external motivation are significant predictors of reasons of in-classroom conflicts. While the sub-dimension of student-teacher relationship predicts the causes of in-classroom conflicts at the highest level, the sub-dimension of future-oriented desires predicts it at the lowest level.