CURRICULAR POLICYMAKING PROCESS IN TÜRKİYE: PERCEPTIONS OF TEACHERS, ACADEMICIANS AND GOVERNMENT OFFICIALS

2022-10
Baştürk, Mustafa
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One of the prerequisites for improving the quality of school education is to have high-quality education policies. In this context, scientific information from stakeholders on curricular policies can contribute to improving the calibre of educational policies. In line with this understanding, this study aimed to investigate the perceptions of three significant stakeholder groups – teachers, academicians and related government officials – regarding the curricular policymaking processes in Türkiye. This qualitative case study was conducted within the scope of the three stages of the “Policy Cycle” Model (problem identification, policy formulation and policy implementation), utilizing the “Single-Case Embedded Design”. Information-rich participants were selected through the “purposive/purposeful sampling method” and its “strategies of criterion sampling”, “snowball/chain sampling” and “maximum variation sampling”. The data were collected from 15 teachers, 9 academicians and 14 government officials through face-to-face in-depth interviews using semi-structured interview protocols. The transcribed voice data were converted into findings utilising content analysis; the results were interpreted and discussed under the 12 main themes that emerged from 58 coded categories. The findings revealed that, for more than forty years, curricular/educational policies in Türkiye had not been formulated and implemented as appropriately as expected. The main reasons for this are exposed as follows: 1) Curricular policy-making processes conducted with institutionalist and elitist approaches under the influence of cultural – mostly political – factors were not very democratic and/or scientific; 2) Proper stakeholder participation could not be (are not) insured; 3) Incongruous dissemination of new policies to practitioners (teachers), and the issues concerning teachers’ negative attitudes, teacher quality and capacity-building was likely to hinder appropriate implementation. Prominent implications are: 1) There is a need for the establishment of an uppermost (umbrella) ideology of education that can guide policies; 2) Democratic and meritocratic stakeholder participation in policy-making must be ensured; 3) Teacher quality should be improved; 4) Curricula (implementations) must be emancipated from the hegemony of LGS and YKS examinations through the abolishment of these two national antagonists, or rather foes.
Educational/curricular problem identification, Educational/curricular policy-making/formulation, Educational/curricular policy implementation, Qualitative case study, Single-case embedded study design
https://hdl.handle.net/11511/99774
Graduate School of Social Sciences, Thesis

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Citation Formats
M. Baştürk, “CURRICULAR POLICYMAKING PROCESS IN TÜRKİYE: PERCEPTIONS OF TEACHERS, ACADEMICIANS AND GOVERNMENT OFFICIALS,” Ph.D. - Doctoral Program, Middle East Technical University, 2022.
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