IMPACT OF QUALITATIVE SECONDARY EDUCATION ACADEMIC PERFORMANCE OF STUDENTS
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CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
1.1 Introduction and Background of the Study
The increasing awareness of the importance of education to the upliftment of the individual and societal standards has awakened in people and nations a conscious effort at devoting their meager resources to acquiring qualitative education. Also, The strategic position of secondary education in the national educational system has made it a target of major concern. This was the opinion of (Segun Adeshina 1984).
It is commonly presumed that formal schooling is one of the important contributions to the skills of an individual and to human capital. It is not the only factor. Parents, individual abilities and friends undoubtedly contribute. Schools nonetheless have a special place, not only because education and ˜skill creation’ are among their prime explicit objectives, but also because they are the factor most directly affected by public policies. It is well established that the distribution of personal incomes in society is strongly related to the amount of education people have had. Generally speaking more schooling means higher lifetime incomes. These outcomes emerge over the long term. It is not people’s income while in school that is affected, nor their income in their first job, but their income over the course of their life time working. Thus, any noticeable effects of the current quality of schooling on the distribution of skills and income will become apparent in the future, when those now in school become a significant part of the labour force. (Levince, 2006).
According to (Adeshina 1984), secondary education stands as a transition zone as it receives primary school leavers and turnout pupils for post secondary education. (Cornell 2010) presents a related opinion, by saying that it is necessary for a person to have secondary education because it is a part of the process of gaining the right education. According to (Cornell, 2002), secondary education is vital because it does not ordinarily serve as the link between what children already imbibed in primary school and college (secondary) education, but also affords them with the opportunity to acquire knowledge that assists in the development of critical and analytical thinking and that of the understanding of the world around. Secondary education is very fundamental in the provision of functional education to the citizens of the country.
There is ample evidence that the quantity of education a person receives (measured as the number of years spent in the school system) goes hand in hand with the quality of that education (usually somewhat narrowly defined as cognitive skills but in fact including non-cognitive skills, values and other psychological and behavioural traits acquired through schooling). The latter aspect has intrinsic value and is also associated with many and various private and social returns. These are not limited to income but also include advantages derived from a range of market and non-market activities. International assessments of cognitive skills suggest that school quality differs widely among and within countries. In particular, children who live in developing countries not only receive fewer years of education but also reach lower achievement levels. Meanwhile, though the evolution of test scores over the years is difficult to assess and interpret, clearly their stagnation in developed countries in recent decades represents an important puzzle. Identifying the determinants of better learning outcomes so as to produce policy-relevant conclusions is an arduous task that requires using approaches from different social sciences. The learning process is extremely complex. It first and foremost involves relationships between teachers and students following a given curriculum and teaching practices, but it also takes place in a broader social context. These relationships are further conditioned by the resources available to schools, the incentive structure teachers face as employees of schools or education authorities, and the correspondence between the values promoted by schools as social institutions and those that prevail in students’ families and society at large (Drunker, 2004).
In improving learning outcomes in schools around the world is not only a matter of implementing a set of adequately designed technical measures. That the experimental evaluation of policy interventions is be coming a standard tool in policy design is certainly a welcome development, but it does not solve the question of which interventions are tested or what their goals are. Schools are social institutions in which day-to-day educational processes interact with the shaping of educational outcomes. The cognitive and noncognitive outcomes of this process may sometimes conflict Adesina (1998), observed that a larger proportion of children are socialized for an increasingly extended part of their childhood, adolescence and early adulthood, questions of curriculum content and of contrast between student background and aspiration present new challenges for the quality of schooling that cannot be addressed only by technical means. The politics of the process, as well as the details of its resourcing and pedagogy, have become increasingly important to its solution (Ochuba, 2008).
Moja (2000), also explains that the education that is offered at this level has two purposes. The first is to prepare pupils to exit school with the necessary skills to find employment and the other is to prepare them to continue with academic careers in higher education. In view of this, Federal Government of Nigeria (2004), in the National Policy of Education asserted that the broad aims of secondary education within overall objectives are to prepare students for useful living within the society and preparing them for higher education.
All the foregoing therefore suggest that secondary education is an instrument par excellence for national development. Thus, secondary education is expected to be of good quality and of high standard.
However, the Nigerian school system is increasingly challenged with many complex problems. There is a general outcry that the standards of education are falling and morals flagging. Some blame pupils for the apparent decline in quality of education and moral values. (Nauman and Kremer, 2003), think that they are due to the nature of changes in all directions. Majority blame the teachers for the woes in our schools. They are not as devoted and dedicated to the cause of education as their predecessors. Teachers as a group blame parents and their children. They also blame government for unattractive condition of service and poor physical facilities in some parts of the educational system. This research project intends not to put the blame on the educational policy or on the system. What the research is saying is that the whole blame is on the lack of adequate educational inspection and supervision, inadequate school facilities, lack of implementation of quality control measure in terms of teacher“pupil’s ratio as stipulated in the National Policy on Education. (Ndioho, 2008)
1.2 Statement of the Problem
Researches from examination body like WARC, WECO, shows that these is high failure in academic performance of the students. Also, many students engage in all forms of malpractices, parents registering their children or wards for ˜Special Centres’. There is also disappearance of traits like honesty, hardwork, punctuality, self-denial and self discipline which are necessary conditions for effective citizenship in the secondary schools. This is a serious problem that deserve attention, that is why the researcher intend to look at qualitative education on the academic performance of Senior SecondarySchool.
In addition, there is the challenge of professionally qualified teachers. According to Egwu (2009), there are alarming differences between teachers certified qualifications, their actual teaching competence and performance on the job.
1.3 Purpose of the Study
The purpose of the study is to examine the impact of qualitative secondary education academic performance of students.
These specific objectives are:
- Examine the extent of the contributions of adequate school facilities on the performance of the student.
- Determine the extent to which the students’ learning attitudes affect the performance of the students.
- Examine how educational inspection and supervision bring about qualitative secondary education.
- Examine the relationship between teachers’ qualification and effective teaching-learning process.
1.4 Research Questions
- What are the contributions of adequate school facilities on the performance of the students?
- To what extent has student leaving attitude affect their academic performance
- What adequate educational inspection and supervision bring about qualitative secondary education?
- What is the relationship between teachers’ qualification and effective teaching learning process?
1.5 Research Hypotheses
Ho1: There is no significant relationship between adequate school facilities and the performance of the students.
Ho2: There is no significant relationship between students’ learning attitude and their performance.
Ho3: There is no significant relationship between educational inspection, supervision and qualitative secondary education.
Ho4: There is no significant relationship between teachers’ qualification and effective learning process.
1.6 Significance of the Study
This research is of significant benefit to teachers, Government, pupils and students as well as the society at large and also educational planners.
The research will help the pupils and students to be able to learn effectively and intelligently, the government will try to prioritize education projects by funding them, teacher will improve on themselves by acquiring necessary professional skills even as good remuneration for them is being worked out, the schools will begin to excel in their examinations, the quality of education will be highly improved, corruption will be reduced and some with proven integrity will be raised higher.
1.7 Scope and Delimitation of Study
This study focuses on the impact of qualitative secondary education on the academic performance of students in the senior secondary schools. The study is limited to five secondary schools in Kosofe Local Government Area of Lagos State.
1.8 Definition of Terms
It is essential to define the terminologies used in this paper because scholars’ view of related concept may greatly differ. Abercrombie (1974), stressed the need for definition of terms when he asserted that The use of word with so many meanings give rise to confusion both in trying to communicate ambiguously with each other and in attempting to think clearly themselves. Based on this assertion, the following terms are defined as used in the context.
Quality: This is a degree of excellence, a distinguish attribute and a peculiar and essential character of an inherent feature.
Input: It refers to school related factors such as curriculum content, textbooks, and learning materials, teachers, parents and the community.
Output: Refers to students who have received required level of education.
Outcome: This refers to the desired result to be shown forth or expected from the students who have undergone a level of education like good citizenship, healthy behaviour, etc.
Process: This includes school climate and teaching/learning encounter which include leadership expectation, teacher’s attitude and environment that is safe and gender sensitive and autonomy among others.
Quality Assurance: This is a holistic method of identifying and resolving problems within the educational system in order to ensure continuous quality improvement.
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