Some Aspects of Students Morality in the Context of the High School Programs Attractivenes

Abstract

The aim of this study was to identify potential predictor variables which could be discriminative for students attending different high school programs (more or less attractive), with the emphasis on some sociodemographic predictors and some components of student morality. The research was carried out on the final classes (third and fourth grade) of grammar schools and vocational secondary schools in Zadar. Schools are categorized into four categories (low, medium, high and very high attractiveness) based on the average school success (grades) of their students in primary school and interest in enrollment in that school. One secondary school (two class departments) was selected from each category and 189 students from selected schools participated in the study. The analysis of the observed results showed the existence of two significant discriminative functions that very well determine the choice/enrollment of high school programs of varying attractiveness. The first discriminative function is mainly saturated by the level of moral reasoning, self-perception of moral qualities and the financial status of the family, and has the greatest predictive power for the choice of grammar school programs in relation to vocational programs. The second discriminative function has less predictive importance and includes some other sociodemographic characteristics (gender, place of living). This function also significantly contributes in the overall criterion variance explanation, by distinguishing more closely those students attending secondary programs of more similar content (for example, differences in attractiveness within different grammar school programs).