An appraisal of academic performance of different school categories in Kwara State, Nigeria
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Date
2018-06
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Volume Title
Publisher
Published by the Publication Unit, University of Education, Winneba, Ghana.
Abstract
Abstract
This study considered the performance of students in different secondary school
categories in Kwara State. The study randomly selected 240 different schools
stratified into public and private, day and boarding as well as single sex or mixed
sex schools out of over 560 registered public and private secondary schools in the
State. A self-designed Academic Performance Checklist was used to collect students’
results while School Categories Questionnaire was administered to harvest
information on the characteristics of the different school types. One research
question was formulated for the study it was answered using percentages while three
research hypotheses were tested using Chi square test. The study found a prevalence
of performance differentials between public and private secondary schools as well
as between day and boarding schools while differences in performance between
mixed gender schools and single gender schools was found to be low. The study
found out significant difference between the performances of Public and Private
secondary schools in Kwara State ( cal X 2.63> critical X 1.96). A significant
difference also existed between the performance of Day students and Boarding
students (cal X 2.64> critical X 1.96) while the study found out no significant
difference between the performance of Single gender schools and Mixed gender
schools (cal X 0.84 < critical X 1.96). The study concluded that school categories
and types have a significant influence on the academic performance of students as
students from private secondary schools performed better than their counterparts
from public secondary schools. Also this influence was significant for boarding and
day schools. The study recommended the re-introduction of boarding system in
public secondary schools to bridge the performance gap.
Description
Keywords
School categories, Single sex schools, Mixed sex schools, Public and private secondary schools