Green organizational behavior of teachers working in private schools

The purpose of this study is to determine the level of green organizational behavior among teachers and to research whether this behavior differs according to teachers' demographic characteristics. In recent days, sustainability has become popular, and a sustainability campaign has been initiated in all educational institutions, particularly. While educational institutions strive to instill sustainability values in their students, they also expect their teachers to serve as role models in this regard. Parents prefer educational institutions that adopt and promote sustainability values, and governments support educational institutions that uphold and integrate these values into their curriculum. This study investigates the green organizational behaviors of private school teachers and their sub-dimensions using quantitative research methods, specifically the survey model. The data were collected through an online survey administered to 250 teachers and administrators from five different private schools in Samsun, Turkey. SPSS was used for data analysis. It was found that 54.22% of the surveyed private school teachers demonstrated a very high level of green organizational behavior, and 42.57% exhibited a high level of green organizational behavior. This indicates that private school teachers' green organizational behavior is high as desired. When examining the sub-dimensions of teachers' green organizational behavior, it was observed that the highest score was obtained in the dimension of environmental sensitivity (m=2.88, sd=4.45±0.51), while the lowest score was obtained in the dimension of environmental participation (m=1.43, sd=4.17±0.67). No significant difference was found in teachers' green organizational behavior based on gender (p>0.05). However, significant differences were observed in the dimension of environmental sensitivity in terms of both the institutions they work for and their professional seniority. The environmental sensitivity score was higher among more senior teachers compared to less senior ones. This finding is one of the most interesting outcomes of the study. The fact that environmental sensitivity is expected to be higher among young people but turns out to be lower, coupled with the significant differences between institutions in this regard, raises the assumption that environmental sensitivity may be influenced by organizational belonging. Therefore, it is particularly important to examine the relationship between environmental sensitivity and organizational belonging in future studies.