Sixty nine statements from different spheres of life, reflecting students'rnfuture time orientation (FrO) were locally prepared, and administered to 500 gradern10 and 11 students from central Ethiopia. Item analyses through principalrncomponent analysis and item-test correlation yielded 51 items and 16 FrO factorsrnwith varimax rotation. The relationship between FrO scale versus students'rnachievement, sex, dwelling, socio-economic status (SES), parents' level of educationrnand perceived intrinsic instrumentality (PI) was investigated. Employing stepwisernregression and X2 analyses a significant effect was found due to achievement andrnPI. Separate as well as combined effects of the rest of variables were not significant.rnConsequently, the scale can profitably be used for assessing strength ofrnmotivation. Inspite of the developmental stage of adolescence that enables themrnto assert the future events realistically, the present findings were interpreted withrnrespect to 'heuristic-bias' (Manger & Tiegen, 1988) that might have occured.rnFurther research directions particularly, for selecting significant variablesrnassociated with FTO have been proposed.