Opinions of school administrators, teachers and parents about social media as a part of school environment

The aim of this research is to evaluate the Opinions of School Administrators, Teachers and Parents about the Social Media as a Part of School Environment. As this study aims to identify the opinions of school administrators, teachers and parents about the social media as a component of a school, phenomenological research design among the qualitative research designs was used. In accordance with this goal, about the experience and understanding of the participants a depth interview was done. The participants of the study were composed of 26 school administrators and 45 teachers working in public or private secondary or highs schools in the province of Malatya and 29 parents who have at least one student in one of these schools. Participants to this study were identified with maximum variation and criterion sampling method. The data for the study were collected with semi-structured interview form in which there were questions to identify the participants in addition to open ended 13 questions for the school administrators, 12 questions for the teachers, and 11 questions for the parents. To determine the interview questions, the literature about the topic were reviewed, experts' opinions about the topic were taken and a pilot application was done to determine the final interview form. After taking the necessary permissions for the interviews, participants who were determined in accordance with willingness and criterion to identify the participants were interviewed by the researcher himself and all the interviews were recorded. The researcher, a sociologist with MA degree and four undergraduate university students spent five weeks to transform recorded voice documents to written text documents. Content analysis method was used during the analyses of the data and the tables in which themes and categories were given with frequencies and percentages to make the analyses more tangible were formed and interpreted. The tables were supported by the direct quotations from the participants' original statements. As a result of the research, similar opinions were stated by the school administrators, teachers and parents about social media. With the opinions of the participants, it was revealed that social media is being used for "communication, informing, socializing and entertainment". In addition to this, the majority of the school administrators (65%), teachers (78%) and parents (72%) were identified that they use social media for communication. It was observed that almost all of the administrators (85%) and teachers (87%) stated that students do not use the social media for educational goals. The percentage about this topic for the parents was quite low (41%) as compared to other participants. It was identified that students' behaviours were affected by the positive things shared on social media. Together with some positive effects like developing themselves and human relations, collecting materials for their lessons, some bad behaviours like profane language, wondering about the bad, wasting time, getting ill-tempered were also identified. With the agreement of the majority of administrators, teachers and parents on the positive effects of social media on academic success, the opinions about reaching the information, getting familiar with the world, using lesson presentations and materials have gained intensity. More than half of the participants agreed on the negative effects of social media on academic success. 50% of the school administrators, 60% of the teachers and 52% of the parents in the study have the opinion than social media affects academic success negatively. According to the participants of the study, social media may lead to wasting time, addiction, not reading books and decreasing the motivation to study lessons. Also there are similar opinions about skill development. Some of the important positive findings about the skill development of social media on students stated by the participants are using the technology, developing research skills, and improving handcraft skills. 58% of the administrators, 65% of teachers and 86% of the parents among the participants agreed on using social media as an instructional material for learning and teaching. Similarly, it was found that social media contributes to communication; especially when the social media was observed to have important contributions to communication with administrators, teachers, students and parents. Having knowledge, finding academic materials, reaching the visuals supporting the school topics, following the up-to-date information are identified as important supportive contributions of social media to education. Wasting time, addiction, undesirable content, having no supervision, affecting social and cultural life negatively, causing communication breaks are the factors identified as disruptors of education. About the use of social media as an instructional tool for learning and teaching, the participants to the study suggested raising awareness, giving social media education, developing a supervision mechanism, promoting sharing beneficial content and having a social media specialist in schools. Some suggestions in parallel with the results of the study, like supporting social media as a means of instruction, developing new methods and techniques, encouraging creating, developing and sharing instructional materials, implementing a social media lesson in schools to develop a consciousness about the use of social media and ensuring students' conscious behaviours in dangerous situations were developed. Key Words: Social Media, Education, School Environment, Academic Success, Communication, Supportive and Disruptive Social Media.