Organizational culture in pre-school: A mixed method research

The aim of this study is to determine the cultural structure existing in schools by taking the opinions of preschool teachers working in kindergarten, primary school, secondary school and high school in Aydın province Efeler district on the organizational culture. The research universe in the quantitative dimension of the research conducted with the mixed method consists of 219 pre-school teachers working in the independent pre-schools, primary school, secondary school and high school in Aydın province Efeler district in the 2019-2020 academic year. In the study, it was tried to reach all the teachers in the study universe, invalid questionnaires that were considered excessive and contradictory were removed from the 219 distributed questionnaires, and the data of 172 teachers in the universe were recorded as statistical analysis values. In the qualitative dimension of the research, with maximum diversity sampling, task in each school type (independent kindergarten, primary school, secondary school and high school) 2 pre-school teachers were selected and a total of 8 pre-school teachers were interviewed. In the research, sequential explanatory design, one of the mixed method designs, was used. In the research, qualitative data were collected and analyzed in order to explain the results obtained after the collection and analysis of quantitative data. The School Culture Scale (SCS) developed by Terzi (2005) was used to collect quantitative data. A semi-structured interview form prepared by the researcher was used to collect qualitative data. 29 questions were asked about school culture. The obtained data were analyzed with parametric tests using SPSS program. In the analysis of qualitative data, content analysis was performed. According to the opinions of preschool teachers in the quantitative aspect of the study, it was concluded that the support culture, success culture, duty culture and finally bureaucratic culture were dominant in the schools where the teachers work, respectively. In the research, school culture analysis was carried out according to the variable of professional seniority, school seniority and school type. The results of the analyzes do not show a significant difference in the perceptions of school culture according to the professional seniority of the teachers. According to the school seniority variable while there is no statistically significant difference in the dimensions of perception levels, support culture, success culture, and duty culture, in the bureaucratic culture dimension, there is a significant difference between the mean scores of teachers with 6-10 years of school seniority and the mean scores of teachers with 16-20 years of school seniority. According to the school type variable, while there is a statistically significant difference in perception levels, support culture, bureaucratic culture and task dimensions, it does not show a significant difference in the dimension of success culture. In the dimension of support culture, there is a significant difference between the mean scores of teachers whose school type is primary school and those of teachers whose school type is independent kindergarten. In the bureaucratic culture dimension, there is a significant difference between the mean scores of teachers whose school type is primary school and those of teachers whose school type is independent kindergarten. There is a significant difference between the mean scores of teachers whose school type is independent kindergarten and those whose school type is high school. In the dimension of duty culture, there is a significant difference between the mean scores of teachers whose school type is primary school and those whose school type is independent kindergarten. There is a significant difference between the mean scores of teachers whose school type is independent kindergarten and those whose school type is high school.. In the qualitative dimension, in the interviews with pre-school teachers, it is seen that the loyalty and mutual relationship between the teachers, which supports the quantitative data, is dominant. According to the results obtained, it is recommended to support the participation of teachers in the decisions taken at school. Thus, the considered teachers will be able to support the school administration in creating a school culture. It is thought that the training of administrators and teachers about different dimensions of culture will also improve school culture.