Investigating high school teachers’ views on cram schools

Abstract

In Turkey, the preparation process for the university entrance exam gives rise to the centres of private courses known as “dershane” which is the Turkish counterpart of cram schools. Dershanes has significant impact on high school education. Sure, people who directly feel positive or negative reflections of this impact are high school teachers. 

 The purpose of this study is to investigate high school mathematics teachers’ views on cram schools. To this end, a questionnaire consisting of open-ended questions was administered to 28 teachers from different high school in Anatolian side of Istanbul. Data were analyzed and interpreted by using document analysis as a qualitative research method.

Some of the important results of this study revealed that according to the teacher, students are going to cram schools for gaining practice, learning test techniques and passing the university entrance exam. In the same time, the teachers are not very happy that cram schools become to an economic sector and they own alone students’ success in the exams.