Schools as Socialisation Contexts: Understanding the Impact of School Climate Factors on Students' Sense of School Belonging

Education is a top priority of the European Union (EU). The EU Education Council has declared that to be the world leader in terms of the quality of education and training systems by 2010, fundamental transformations in education should be carried out in each country according to its national context and traditions. As a candidate country, Turkey shares this common objective. Yet, the mean school attainment and net education enrollment rates in Turkey are still behind the EU averages. The education literature indicates students' sense of school belonging as an important predictor of school attainment. This study aims to identify the policy manipulable social aspects of schools that can be instrumental in increasing students' sense of school belonging in a sample of 799 middle school students attending public schools in Istanbul, Turkey. The conceptual model posits that students' satisfaction with both the social relationships in the school and the school environment has consequences for their sense of school belonging. The results of the structural equation model analysis revealed a plausible model. Satisfaction with social relationships emerged as a stronger predictor of sense of school belonging than satisfaction with the school environment. Further comparisons of the same conceptual model for schools with low and high socioeconomic conditions yielded different associations among the study variables. The findings are discussed in terms of their relevance to the education system in Turkey and other less affluent societies with similar social, cultural, and economic conditions.