THE EFFECT OF VALUE CENTERED SCHOOL CULTURE ON TEACHER CANDIDATES

Values are benchmarks that individuals internalize as a result of their interaction with their environment and that determine their personality traits, which direct their ideal behaviors through education. These benchmarks are needed for acquiring value centered school culture at schools. The aim of the present study is to examine and understand the extent to which value centered school culture in Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC) has integrated in the university environment, as evaluated by teacher candidates enrolled in a private university. To that end, the study used a descriptive survey model, a quantitative research design. The Value Centered School Culture Scale was utilized to facilitate the evaluation of the value-based school culture in the university environment by teacher candidates. The study used the survey technique as the data collection method. In this respect, the study was conducted on 240 teacher candidates enrolled in the Ataturk Education Faculty of a private university affiliated with the central district of Nicosia during the academic year 2022-2023. The data obtained from the participants were analyzed using the Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) 26.0 software. The Cronbach's alpha value obtained for the participants' responses to the Value Centered School Culture Scale was 0.836. The distribution of students' socio-demographic characteristics was determined through frequency analysis and descriptive statistics were provided for the scale scores. The normality of the distribution of students' scores on the scale was examined using the Kolmogorov-Smirnov test. The data did not show a normal distribution. Therefore, the Mann Whitney U test and Kruskal-Wallis H test were used to compare the scale scores among students based on their socio-demographic characteristics. The students were distributed based on their socio-demographic characteristics. Of the participants, 18.75% were female and 81.25% were male, 67.08% were in the 1923 age range, while 32.92% were in the 24-28 age range, 75.83% were enrolled in the preschool teacher education program, 32.50% were first grade students, 30.42% were second grade students, 13.75% were third grade students and 23.33% were fourth grade students.