Opinions of Education Administrators and Teachers on Vegetation Geography: Comparative Case Study*

Vegetation geography subjects are believed to be barely taught in secondary schools. Yet it is a major defect in terms of environmental education. The assessment of opinions of senior administrators, high school principals, and geography and biology teachers has a high significance to eliminate such defect. In this study the qualitative research method was used. Semi-structured interview was done to gather the data and the content analysis was employed. While there is a small number of studies on vegetation geography in Cyprus, there is none on such education. The existing studies have botanical basis and thus do not have the nature to be interpreted from environmental elements and geographical aspects. The limited vegetation subjects given in the geography and biology text books are far from reflecting the interaction of natural vegetation of Cyprus with climate, land forms and human factors. Opinions stated in the study shows the importance of vegetation geography in North Cyprus. This study is the first in the literature.