Student safety in primary schools: A sample of Buyukcekmece county

Abstract

Although, there are codes and regulations which arrange student safety, it is still a serious problem for students in school environments. Student safety has several aspects. Most of the time, crime and violation is considered to be a major part of the problem. But, the environment's physical safety, and the pupil's emotional safety also should be considered. In order to find out the reasons of the safety problem with whole aspects, a two-dimension questionnaire was carried out in primary schools of Buyukcekmece County (Istanbul / Turkey). In the questionnaire, the importance of student safety according to managers and teachers and, fulfillment degree of student safety in their schools are assessed. These opinions are evaluated separately as public schools, private schools, managers and teachers. For the evaluation of the results, central tendency measures and independent samples t-test are used. Independent from the school type, all managers agree that student safety is very important. On the other hand, fulfillment of the student safety is better accomplished in private schools than in public schools according to managers (p < 0.05). The importance of student safety is more important and fulfillment of the student safety is better for private school teachers than public school teachers (p < 0.05). According to these evaluations, in order to fulfill the student safety needs, necessary actions should be taken place, especially in public schools, codes and regulations should be revised and the consciousness level of managers and teacher on student safety with whole aspects should be raised.