Impact of a public military high school environment upon students' attitudes toward education

The purpose of this ethnographic, qualitative case study was to explore whether the environment within a public military high school had an impact upon the work ethic, self-discipline, and attitudes of students toward school, learning, and taking and achieving higher scores on standardized tests. A combination of an 11-question Likert-style survey instrument and focus group interviews were used to collect the data and capture the military academy students’ perspectives. The findings from the survey questionnaire produced an overall positive result regarding whether the environment at the public military high school studied had an impact upon their attitude toward school, learning, and taking and achieving higher scores on standardized tests. Seven themes emerged from the focus group responses including teacher concern, learning environment, structure, safety, preparation for the future, respect, and pride