Abstract:
School climate is the quality and character of school life which is based on patterns of students’,
parents’, and school personnel’s experience of school life of which Ethiopian school’s records are
few. Cognizant of this gap this study has been undertaken. The study examined school climate of
public and private schools. The study was based on four major elements of school climate (safety,
teaching learning, interpersonal relationship, and school physical environment). In this study both
quantitative and qualitative methods were used. The respondents were selected using both
probability and non-probability sampling techniques. Questionnaire, interview, FGD and
document analyses were used to collect data and the quantitative data was analyzed using
descriptive statistics such as frequency, mean, percentage, and standard deviation. To determine
the relationship between elements of school climate and type of schools, T-test was utilized.
Furthermore, data obtained from interview, FGD, document analysis and open ended questions
were qualitatively analyzed. The study revealed that school climate was found to be significant
contributor of academic achievement to private schools than public schools. It was concluded that
private schools are better in creating positive school climate than public schools and school
climate and students’ academic achievement has positive correlation to one another; and sharing
best experiences one from the other, employing different motivating strategies, treating students
with respect and others were recommended.
