Principals' opinion about implementation of teaching professional ethics in Turkey

The aim of this study is to describe the unethical behaviors by the headmasters regarding the application of the principles of teaching professional ethics, the causes of these behaviors and what should be done to prevent these behaviors and to reveal the headmasters' views on what their own practices are when they encounter unethical behaviors. In the study, case study pattern, criterion sampling and snowball sampling methods from the subunits of the qualitative research were used. In this context, 17 school principals with at least fifteen years of administrative seniority working in Düzce province were interviewed. By using a semi-structured form, four open-ended questions and sub-questions were created under each prepared question to help the participant understand them better. The interview texts created as a result of the interviews with the participants were analyzed and interpreted according to the descriptive and content analysis approach. With the analysis of the findings obtained in the research, teachers are inadequate in their communication skills while performing their profession, they ignore the individual differences of the students and evaluate them according to material facts rather than their moral competencies, they do not apply their assessment and evaluation activities according to the legislation, they do not like their profession and perform them in economic concerns, they develop a negative perspective towards their colleagues, they cannot communicate with them in a healthy way, they are not able to communicate with the parents of the students properly, they demand everything from the school administration and not cooperate with them well. The reasons for the unethical behavior of the teachers are that they do not update themselves and cannot provide professional development, they are insufficient in practice despite having academic and pedagogical competence, they attend classes without any preliminary preparation, they approach the students unconsciously at the point of being a role model, they control the students with grades from a different perspective in assessment and evaluation, they cannot communicate with their coworkers healthily, their education is only formed by the academic knowledge rather than practice-oriented, the central structure in the education system changes, so the education policies and philosophy change depending on the person as well, the public servants law no.657 is a great protective and privilege armor over teachers, the attitudes and behaviors of school administrators towards teachers are not fair, the teacher who has just started the profession does not have a colleague to take as a role model, the teacher develops selfish personality because he/she cannot find more in return for the profession, he/she is not being satisfied with the financial gain provided by his/her profession, and that the teacher reflects his/her psychological problems to his/her profession. In order to prevent unethical behaviors, teachers should review their professional competencies, communicate and cooperate with all the coworkers, the criterion observed in the recruitment process of teacher candidates does not include only KPSS but also it should assess the eagerness to do the profession of the person who will perform the teaching profession as well as psychological status, human values, evaluation within the scope of academic reference of the teachers, school administration are supposed to treat everyone fairly and the legal regulations should be effective. In the findings regarding the practices of school principals in unethical behaviors, school principals are tend to not take legal action in order not to damage the image of the school and not to make the situation a problem by using persuasion and communication when they encounter unethical behaviors, and unethical behavior that is concrete results in legal recourse, the headmasters make the decision to take legal action by evaluating it in line with their own moral attitudes, and it turns out that the teacher's style and attitude, the insistence on his/her mistakes, perpetuating unethical behaviors are the factors affecting the school principal's decision to take legal action. In line with the findings obtained in the research, being aware of the existence of ethical principles and having awareness on this issue will allow to prevent most unethical behaviors in advance. While determining education policies, starting from the understanding of the country's educational philosophy, it is necessary to take into account cultural values and to adopt ethical principles that can respond to social expectations with a well-regulated legal framework and to update them constantly in developing conditions. In addition, the teachers who have obtained their professional qualifications should be aware of how much responsibility this sacred profession requires.