An analysis of the burnout level of primary school teaching department student teachers

This study aims to investigate Çukurova University, The Faculty of Education, The Department of Primary School Teaching fourth year-student teachers? burnout level and to see whether there are meaningful relations between this level and some variables; namely, gender, perceived economic level, the type of high school graduated, the rank of the university preference, the mean of scores and the accommodation during the university life. Also, the student teachers? point of views about situations that might be influential on their burnout level were taken.This research was conducted in the 2007-2008 academic year, with 233 fourth year-Primary School Teaching Department student teachers (137 females, 9 males) at Çukurova University.In order to determine the burnout level, ?the short version of the Burnout Inventory (BMS)? developed by the researcher, herself, and ?Personal Information Form? were used. In addition; ?the Interview Forms? prepared by the researcher were administered to the student teachers in order to find out possible influential factors on the student teachers? burnout level. T-test and variance analysis were conducted on the quantitative data and content analysis was performed on the qualitative data of the study.The results showed that the burnout level of 66 student teachers out of 233 (28.3 %) was very low. 99 of them (42.5 %) faced the burnout danger and 48 of them (20.6 %) had the burnout problem. Lastly; 20 of them (8.6 %) experienced the burnout problem at a serious level. The student teachers? burnout level changed according to their socio-economic level. However; gender, the type of the high-school graduated, the range of university preference, the mean of scores and the accommodation did not show any changes.As a result of the analysis on the qualitative data, different from the student teachers with high level of burnout, the student teachers with low level of burnout expressed their satisfaction from their department they went and they said that hey were hopeful about the future. In terms of the exam for the selection of civil servant (KPSS), occupational fears, the feeling of being ready for the profession, the perceived status of the profession in the society and the approach of dealing with problems, both groups had the same ideas.Keywords: student teachers, the burnout syndrome