Abstract

This study investigated the occupational concerns of pre-service teachers attending to education faculties. Effects of some demographical variables including gender, department, grade and socio-economic status on pre-service teachers’ occupational concerns were also examined. The study was a survey in which 650 pre-service teachers from four different education faculties participated in. To collect data ‘Occupational Concern Scale-OCS’ was used. Data were analyzed with descriptive statistical techniques including arithmetical mean, standard deviation and percentage. To find out whether the opinions of participants on occupational concerns differed according to research variables t-test and ANOVA was used. Results indicated that participants are moderately concerned about teaching occupation. Comparative analyses showed that there was a significant difference between groups in terms of gender, SES and department, but no differences were seen in grades of participants. Results imply that participants who are female, from low SES and Turkish language teaching are more concerned about the teaching occupation. In the end, it was concluded that Turkish pre-service teachers have occupational concern to some degree.

Key words: Pre-service teachers, occupation, concern, demographical variables.