Home Factors and Academic Performance of Secondary School Students In
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HOME FACTORS AND ACADEMIC PERFORMANCE OF SECONDARY SCHOOL STUDENTS IN WEST - BUDAMA COUNTY TORORO DISTRICT A Thesis Presented to the school of Postgraduate Studies and Research Kampala International University Kampala, Uganda In Partial Fulfillment of the Degree of Master of Arts in Education Management and Administration. BY: NIKWENSERI ABEL BIRUSYA MED/25151/81/DU MAY 2011. DECLARATION A I NIKWENSERI ABEL BIRUSYA registration no. MED/25151/81/Du hereby declare that this dissertation is my original work and has never been submitted to any institution for any award. -er)≤~e~P1 4W f~Zf~d Name and Signature of Candidate ~l~_ ~≤~_ ~1,i Date DECLARATION B “I confirm that the work reported in this dissertation was carried out by the candidate under my supervision.” ~ Name and Signature of Supervisor Date APPROVAL SHEET This dissertation entitled “Home factors and Academic Performance of Secondary School Students In West Budama County — Tororo District” prepared and submitted by Nikwenseri Abel Birusya in partial fulfillment of the requirement for the degree of Master of Arts in Education Administration and Management has been examined and approved by the panel on oral examination with the grade of PASSED. F%...~— Name and Signature of Chairma ~.o ~. ~ Name And Signature Of Supervisor Name And Signature Of Panelist~ ~ Name And Signature Of Panelist Date of Comprehensive Examination Grade: Name and Signature of Director, SPGSR Name and Signature of DVC, SPGSR DEDICATION This piece of work Is dedicated to Mrs. Charity Mutungi, Mrs. Maria Blrusya, for their support. Iv ACKNOWLEDGMENT In the first place, I am grateful to the Almighty God for giving me the strength, good health, and opportunity to carry out this study. I wish to thank my Supervisor Dr. S.O. Salami for his guidance. To all my Professors and Lecturers who taught me at Kampala International University. I am also very grateful to my Superiors : Bishop Callist Rubaramira of Kabale Diocese, Arch Bishop Denis Kiwanuka, Lote of Tororo Diocese, Fr, Justus Lucas Kiiza ( Financial Administrator — Kabale Diocese), Rector and Staff Nagongera Seminary (Tororo Diocese) for the material, moral, and spiritual support given to me. I am grateful for the support given by M/s Kedisi Margret, Mr. and Mrs. Paul Koorinako, Fr. Karugaba Silver, Ms. Kabasilta J, Mrs. Anne Kobel, Aunt Mary Tukahirwa, Mrs. Salome K. Gasasira, M/S Jennifer Kabeera, Mr. Turyakira Anaclet, Rev. Sr. Laeticia Achieng, Sr. Nabutuwa Mary Beatrice, M/s Doroth Akoth, and all authors whose books I have referred to. May Almighty God continue to bless you abundantly. V ABSTRACT. This study was to establish the relationship between home factors; occupation of V parents, family size, parents level of education, and student home activities and academic performance of secondary school in West Budama county Tororo District. The study took a descriptive correlation design. The study population V was one hundred and fifty respondents which comprised of students. Simple V random sampling was employed. Data was measured in numbers and analyzed with Pearson product moment correlation and multiple regression analysis. The researcher used self administered questionnaires for students. The results showed that all the home factors jointly contributed significantly to the students’ academic performance. However, the results revealed that parents’ occupation, family size, parents’ level of education had no separate significant contribution towards students’ academic performance, It was students’ home activities that had a significant contribution to student academic performance in West Budama county Tororo District. It was therefore concluded that; parents’ occupation, family size, parents level of education do not have separate significant relationships with students academic performance in West Budama — Tororo District. However, students’ home activities have a significant relationship with academic performance of secondary school students in West Budama = Tororo District. The researcher therefore recommended the following; Parents need to increase students’ home activities since they contribute significantly to students’ academic performance. Teachers, school administrators, and counselors need to be aware of the home related factors so that they can help students to learn better at school by counseling them, Education planners and implementers or education policies need to have in mind these home related factors when making policies that may work in favor of students’ academic performance bearing in mind their home backgrounds. vi TABLE OF CONTENTS Page Declaration A Declaration B ii Approval sheet iii Dedication iv Acknowledgement v Abstract vi Table of contents viii List of tables xi List of figures xii List of abbreviations xiii Chapter One THE PROBLEM AND ITS SCOPE Background of the study 1 Statement of the problem 4 Purpose of the study 5 Research objectives 5 VIII Research Questions 5 Hypothesis 6 Scope 6 Significance of the study 7 Operational definitions of Key terms 8 TWO REVIEW OF RELATED UTERATURE Introduction 10 Concepts, Ideas, Opinions From Authors! experts io Theoretical perspectives 22 Related Studies 25 THREE METHODOLOGY Research design 32 Research population 32 Sample size 33 Research instrument 33 Validity of the instrument 34 Reliability of the instrument 35 Data gathering procedures 36 ix Data analysis 36 Ethical considerations 36 Limitations of the study 37 FOUR PRESENTATION, ANALYSIS AND INTERPRETATION OF DATA 38 FIVE FINDINGS, CONCLUSIONS, RECOMMENDATIONS 45 Findings 45 Conclusions 46 Recommendations 46 References 48 Appendices 57 Appendix I — Transmittal Letter 57 APPENDIX II- Research Instruments 58 APPENDIX III- UCE RESULTS of the ten sampled secondary schools for the last 9 years in West I3udama County - Tororo District 65 APPENDIX III — Researcher’s Curriculum Vitae 69 x LIST OF TABLES Table 1: Population and sample size of respondents 32 Table 2: Profile of respondents (Students) age, gender, class, School category and location 39 Table 3: Correlation matrix of Home factors and student academic Performance 40 Table 4: Model summary of home factors as predictors of student Academic performance 42 Table 5: Regression co-efficient of home factors as predictors of Student academic performance 43 xi LIST OF FIGURES Figure 1: Conceptual Framework of the Study 24 XII LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS ANOVA = Analysis of variance IODL = Institute of Distance Learning MDG = Millennium Development Goals SAQ = Self Administered Questionnaire SPSS = Statistical Package for Social Science U.C~E = Uganda Certificate of Education U.RE = Universal Primary Education U~S.E = Universal Secondary Education RT~A = Parents Teachers Association XIII CHAPTER ONE THE PROBLEM AND ITS SCOPE Background of the study In Uganda, formal education has been recognized as an important instrument in the political, social and economic development and transformation of the people and the country at large. Many parents have not been able to train their children up to secondary schools due to home factors such as lack of parents involvement in their children’s learning, big family sizes which make it hard to get enough resources to facilitate their children in good schools, low levels of parents education to inspire children’s learning activities and their occupations which determine the level of income (Cook, 1996). Following the millennium development goals (MDG), Uganda started universal secondary education (UPE) in 1997 and universal secondary education (USE) in 2007. This was aimed at improving the human resource and eradication of poverty in the long run (Nakiyingi, 2008). In spite of the government’s efforts to improve human resource and eradication of poverty by introducing universal primary education and universal secondary education, academic performance of secondary school students is still poor especially in Uganda certificate of education examinations (UCE) (Ministry of education Uganda secondary schools Directory, 2009). Academic performance refers to the extent to which students have been able to perform well in the examinations as measured by tests or examinations which are done at the end of topic, a term, year or education cycle such as Uganda certificate of 1 education (UCE). Academic performance is the measure of students’ progress in the direction of acquiring the knowledge and skills they are intended to acquire from the given course of study and is measured by appropriate tests and examinations. In this study academic performance is measured in terms of grades that students score in national examinations such as Uganda certificate of education, In West Budama county —Toro District, there has been poor academic performance of secondary school students for many years as reported by ministry of Education and sports in secondary schools directory 2009 covering a period from 2000-2008. From this report majority of students (1184, 30.9%) were in grade 3, (1082=28.3% grade 4), 352=9.3% grade 9 while 296=7.7% were in grade 1 and 912=23.8% were in grade 2. This study views students’ academic performance as resulting from home based factors such as occupation of parents, family size, parents’ level of education and students home activities, The study is based on the fact that the family sets the life style and influences the chances for the children in the sense that a family may be supportive, neutral and antagonistic to school education and performance. The value which each family attaches to school education, determines the motivation