The levels of identification with school and student sense of trust in teachers of high school students

The main aim of this study is to determine the level of high school students' identification with school and the level of trust they have in their teachers. In addition, it was aimed to adapt the "Identification with School Scale" developed by Voekl (2006) to Turkish to determine the level of identification of the students with their school. The research also tried to determine whether the scores of students' identification with school and their trust in teachers' were significantly different according to gender, school type, grade level, and private tutoring status. Finally, the research aimed to determine the relationship between the student trust in teacher & student identification with school. For this reason descriptive, causal comparative and relational research designs were used in this study. The population of the research was formed by 7983 students who were enrolling the secondary education institutions in the Kahta district center in Adıyaman province during spring semester of the 2015-2016 academic year. The sample of the study consisted of 1124 students determined by stratified sampling among the students who were educated in these schools. For the students who participated in the survey to collect the data, a test battery was used which included the Trust in Teacher Scale and the Identification with School Scale. The obtained data were analyzed by SPSS program. The analysis of the data first included descriptive statistics. Independent groups t-test was used to determine whether the level of students' trust in teachersand their level of identification with school were significantly different according to gender and private tutoring status variables. One way ANOVA was conducted to determine whether students' trust in teachers and their level of identification with school were significantly different from school type and class level. Where significant differences were identified for this analysis, a Scheffe multiple comparison test was conducted to determine the source of the difference between the groups. In the study, a simple linear regression analysis was conducted to determine whether the level of students' trust in teachers was a significant predictor of their levels of identification with schools. As a result of the descriptive statistics, it was determined that the perceptions of the students' level of identification with school and the level of the trust in teachers were above the average. When the levels of the students' identification with school is evaluated in terms of gender variable, it is concluded that there is a significant difference in favor of female students. It was determined that there was a statistically significant difference between female and male students' perceptions of trust in teachers in favor of female students. As a result of the analysis based on the scores obtained from the identification with school scale, there was a significant difference between the vocational high school students and the science high school students in favor of the vocational high school students. The scores of students' trust in teachers scale also differ significantly in terms of school type variable. According to the results of the study, the vocational high school students' perceptions of the trustin teachers are higher than those of the Anatolian and the science high school students. When evaluated in terms of class level, it was determined that 9th grade students had higher perceptions about the level of identification with school than other students. The higher the class level, the lower the level of identification with school. It was determined that the scores of the students' trusting teachers scale differ significantly from the class level variable. As the class level increased, the result was that the level of trust in teachers decreased. It has been determined that there is a significant difference between the students who go to a private teaching institution and the students who do not go to a private teaching institution in favor of the second one about the identification with school. In other words, students who do not attend a private teaching course perceive themselves as more identified with the school than the other students. For the trust in teacher scale, it was determined that there is a significant difference between the students who attend a private teaching institution and the ones who do not in favor of the students who do not attend a private teaching institution. Finally, it has been determined that there is a positive and high level of relationship between trust in teachers and identification with school. Key words: Identification with school, student trust in teachers, high school students.