Examining Parents' Opinions on Safe School

Abstract

The aim of this study is to examine the views of parents on safe schools and to develop solutions to the problems encountered in a safe school environment based on these views. The research was conducted with phenomenology design, one of the qualitative research methods. The study group of the research consists of 16 parents selected by criterion sampling and maximum sampling method. The research was carried out with volunteer parents who have at least one student in primary school, secondary school, high school age, high school, bachelor's or master's degree graduates in Fatih district of Istanbul province. The data of the study were collected by semi-structured interview technique and analysed with descriptive analysis method. According to the results obtained, parents' views on safe school were categorised under 6 themes. These themes are safe school ecosystem, social relations and educational safety, health and safety balance in education, resources and implementations for safety and governance, communication and solidarity, safe behaviour and moral values. As a result, it has been determined that parents' views on safe school environment are mainly gathered around physiological and psychological safety for students and school climate based on mutual trust of stakeholders. Based on these results, it is recommended that policy makers and implementers in education should prioritise measures to ensure school safety.