comparative assessment of students' academic

INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF BUSINESS AND MANAGEMENT RESEARCH

131

COMPARATIVE ASSESSMENT OF STUDENTS’ ACADEMIC

PERFORMANCE IN BUSINESS STUDIES EXAMINATIONS IN URBAN AND

RURAL SECONDARY SCHOOLS IN EDO STATE

Hope Aritsesoma, ODIA

SCHOOL OF BUSINESS

DELTA STATE POLYTECHNIC, OGWASHIKWU

[email protected], 2348050567150

Abstract

The study comparatively assessed students’ academic performance in business studies

examinations in urban and rural secondary schools in Edo South Senatorial District.

Three research questions were raised to guide the study and one null hypothesis was

tested at a 0.05 level of significance for the study. The ex-post facto survey research

design was used for this study. The population of the study was 38,436 JSS 3 business

studies students for three academic sessions in the seven local governments that made up

the senatorial district. A random sampling technique was employed to select 18, 524

students from four (4) local governments in the senatorial district. Students Results in the

basic education certificate examination (BECE) for three academic sessions; namely

2016/2017, 2017/2018, and 2018/2019 academic sessions from the Ministry of

Education, Edo State was used for this study. Data collected were analyzed using

descriptive statistics of mean, frequency counts, and percentage. The t-test was used to

test the hypothesis. The study revealed that over the course of the three academic

sessions; urban students performed low in business studies examination while rural

students performed high. The difference in the performance between urban and rural

students was in favour of rural students. From the results of the analysis, it was

concluded that students in rurally located schools performed better than their

counterparts in urban schools. There was a significant difference in the academic

performance between rural and urban school located students. Consequently, it was

recommended that enabling environment should be provided for teachers while

attempting to increase students’ performance through the provision of instructional

materials. Parents especially those in the urban areas with low educational levels should

enroll in adult education to guide their students. Furthermore, educational planners,

curriculum planners and teachers could use the parent Teacher Association fora for the

reorientation of parents on the relevance of buying textbooks for their wards.

Keywords: Business Studies, Academic Performance.

mailto:[email protected]


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INTRODUCTION

The performance of students in any academic task has always been of special interest to

educators, parents, and society at large. The primary concern of any educator who is

entrusted with the responsibility of selecting students for any advanced training program

in a given field is the ability to estimate as accurately and as early as possible, the

probability that such candidates will succeed or fail. There seems to be a challenge to all

educational stakeholders in Edo State and this is the persistent poor academic

performance of students in certificate examination. The problem of poor academic

performance is so great that it has become a necessity for many students to pass the

number of subjects required for admission into tertiary institutions at once (Ajayi, 2011).

Olagunju (2012) further lamented about the present poor performance in different school

subjects of secondary school students owing to their results in certificate examination. No

wonder, most of the employees in organizations are not creative. What happens to the

educational system that produced Professors, Engineers, Teachers, Medical Doctors and

other experts of repute that are often acknowledged and referred to as icons? Why is the

same thing not being replicated by the same system for the growth and development of a

nation today? Why are the parents not sensitive to their civic responsibility of educating

their children? Why are the children not interested in the growth and development of their

lives? Why is there low performance of students at both internal and external

examinations in Business Studies?

Business Studies is one of the prevocational subjects at junior secondary school. It is a

comprehensive and practical subject that prepares students for managerial roles in both

private and public sector of the economy. The educational provisions in Business studies

are made with the obvious understanding that not every person wants education, but

every person wants work, and if a person who does not want education must work then

all he or she needs is the competence for the job (Ekpenyong, 2001)

Ekpenyong (2001) defined business studies as the study of economics financial and

management matters especially as part of a secondary school, college, or university

course. Business is an essential component of both secondary and tertiary education,

practices, and economic issues, developing skills necessary for the use of technology

proficiently. It also involves acquiring knowledge to become a wise consumer and

preparing students individually for post-secondary educations and the workplace, which

are some of the goals of the business studies programme. Business studies can also be

viewed as a comprehensive discipline whose instructional programme encompasses the

acquisition of appropriate skill and competence needed by all students in order to

effectively and efficiently manage their personal businesses and also contribute to the

economic development of the society (Obi, 2006). Business studies students need to

improve their academic performance if this is to be achieved.


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Scholars have defined academic performance in many ways. According to Maruff (2012),

academic performance is the combined outcome of attitude and interest, though the two

variables are positively correlated, a high value of one necessarily means a high value of

the other. Academic performance of students is a vital indicator which policy makers,

educational planners and other stakeholders in education are interested in. According to

Aremu (2012), researchers who focus on the academic performance of students have

continued to examine diverse phenomena that have been found to predict performance.

He also contends that there have been a number of reviewers or researchers that have

critically examined the relationship between certain explanatory constructs and academic

performance with diverse findings. Yet, the battery of variables used to predict students’

academic performance in formal face-to-face educational situations, may not adequately

serve as predictors of academic performance (Kumar, 2012).

The perennial poor performance of candidates in the Junior School Certificate

Examination in the last five years has generated serious concern among educators,

researchers and the general public.

For instance, from the statistics of performance in business studies in Edo State Junior

Secondary Schools, the following were observed.

Table 1. Business Studies Result; May/June 2013-2018

YEAR %with credit and above % with passes D7-E8 % failed F9

A1-C6

2013 17.7 13.7 68.9

2014 11.0 22.2 66.8

2015 9.5 20.2 70.3

2016 16.7 22.6 60.7

2017 20.2 20.8 59.0

2018 17.7 37.2 45.1

Source: Edo State Ministry of Education, 2018

From the table, it can be observed that there is mass failure of students in business studies

over the years in Edo State public junior secondary schools and this has given a lot of

concern to all stakeholders. The performance year in year out is nothing to write home

about. This has prompted parent to enroll their children in private schools while richer

ones prefer to enroll their children in first class schools. Studies in the past devoted much

attention to student factors and school factors in predicting students’ academic

performance with little or no attention on Rural/Urban dichotomy factors. The researcher

therefore, deems it fit to examine the academic performance of students in public rural


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and urban schools in Edo South Senatorial District of Edo State, Nigeria. Some

researchers found no difference in the performance of students while some found

difference in the performance of students with respect to other regions. Based on this

conflicting reports and having considered the huge amount of money spent on education

yearly, and in order to fill this yearning gap, this study investigated the state of

performance of students in rural schools with their counterparts in urban schools

Purpose of the Study

The main purpose of this study was to comparatively assess students’ academic

performance in business studies examinations in urban and rural secondary schools in

Edo South Senatorial District.

Specifically the study determined;

1. The performance of students in business studies examination in Urban schools in


2. The performance of students in business studies examination in Rural schools in


3. The mean difference in the performance of students in Urban and Rural schools in


Research Questions

The following research questions guided the study

1. What is the performance of students in business studies examination in Urban

schools in Edo South Senatorial District?

2. What is the performance of students in business studies examination in Rural

schools in Edo South Senatorial District?

3. What is the mean difference in the academic performance of students in business

studies in Urban and Rural schools in Edo South Senatorial District.

Hypothesis

The following null hypothesis was formulated and tested at a 0.05 level of significance.

1. There is no significant difference in the academic performance between urban and

rural school students in business studies in Edo South Senatorial District. The

study was limited to public junior secondary school students in the Edo South

Senatorial District of Edo State.

METHODOLOGY

The ex-post facto survey research design was employed in this research. This research

design was preferred as there was no manipulation of the variables by the researcher. The

main focus of the study lies in testing contributions and drawing inferences from the data

that were collected after the events had already occurred.


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The population for this study consisted of all the students in Edo South Senatorial District

public Junior Secondary School (JSS3) in all the public junior secondary schools in the

seven local government areas in the District which are Oredo, Egor, Ikpoba-Okha,

Orhionmwon, Ovia South-West, Ovia North-East and Uhumwonde. Data collected for

this study indicated that 38,436 JSS3 students sat for business studies examinations for

the three sessions under study (Edo State Ministry of Education, 2019).

Random sampling was used to select the four local governments with Oredo & Ikpoba-

Okha been urban due to commercialization and business activities while Ovia North East

& South West rural due to farming activities. The sample is 18,524 students. This is

shown in table 2.

Table 2 Students Population Distribution

LGA No of Candidates Registered Session

Oredo 1506 2016/2017

2963 2017/2018

2754 2018/2019

Ikpoba-Okha 2862 2016/2017

2879 2017/2018

2953 2018/2019

Ovia North East 329 2016/2017

254 2017/2018

306 2018/2019

Ovia South West 581 2016/2017

534 2017/2018

603 2018/2019

Total 18524

Source: Field Study, 2019

The analysis of academic performance for each local government was done using Basic

Education Certificate Examination (BECE) result.

Students pro forma was used to collect students’ results in BECE Business Studies. The

result is standardized and as such does not require validity nor reliability.

The researcher personally visited the Ministry of Education, Edo State, and collected the

BECE results in Business Studies for three academic sessions; namely 2016/2017,

2017/2018, and 2018/2019 academic sessions. The data collected in this study were

analyzed using descriptive statistics. The descriptive tools of mean, standard deviation,

and percentage were used to describe the students’ performance scores. While the t-test

was used to test the hypothesis.


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Results

The results of the analyzed data are presented below.

Research Question 1: What is the performance of students in business studies

examination in Urban schools in Edo South Senatorial District?

The data collected in respect of Research Question 1 are presented in Table 3.

Table 3a. Academic Performance of Students in Urban Schools for 2016/2017

session

Grades Frequency Percentage

Pass 1460 33.42

Fail 123 2.82

Resits 2785 63.76

Total 4368 100


Table 3b. Academic Performance of Students in Urban Schools for 2017/2018

session


Pass 2142 36.67

Fail 655 11.21

Resits 3045 52.12

Total 5842 100


Table 3c. Academic Performance of Students in Urban Schools for 2018/2019

session


Pass 2242 39.29

Fail 542 9.49

Resits 2923 51.22

Total 5707 100


From tables in 3, 4368 students sat for the examination in 2016/2017 while 5842 and

5707 students in 2017/2018 and 2018/2019 respectively. The results indicated that only

1460 candidates representing 33.42% passed at first sitting in the first year, the number

however increased to 36.67% and 39.29% in the second and third year respectively. 2785

students representing 63.76% failed but have the opportunity to resit the examination

again, the second and third year had a decline in percentage in comparison to the first


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year with 52.12% and 51.22% respectively. 123 students representing 2.82% failed the

exam completely, however increased over the course of the three years with year two

having 11.21% and year three having a 9.49% failure rate.

This shows that over the course of the three years, the failure rate of the students was

higher than the pass rate in urban schools.

Research Question 2: What is the performance of students in business studies

examination in Rural schools in Edo South Senatorial District?


Table 4a. Academic Performance of Students in Rural Schools for 2016/2017 session


Pass 818 89.89

Fail 12 1.32

Resits 80 8.79

Total 910 100


Table 4b. Academic Performance of Students in Rural Schools for 2017/2018 session


Pass 721 91.50

Fail 10 1.27

Resits 57 7.23

Total 788 100


Table 4c. Academic Performance of Students in Rural Schools for 2018/2019 session


Pass 784 86.25

Fail 19 2.09

Resits 106 11.66

Total 909 100


From tables in 4, 910 students sat for the examination in 2016/2017 while 788 and 909

students in 2017/2018 and 2018/2019 respectively. The results indicated that 818

candidates representing 89.89% passed at first sitting in the first year, the percentage

however increased to 91.50% and reduced to 86.25% in the second and third year

respectively. 80 students in the 2016/2017 session representing 8.79% failed but have the


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opportunity to resit the examination again, second-year had a decline in percentage in

comparison to the first year with 7.23% while an increase in the third year with 11.66%.

12 students representing 1.32% failed the exam completely, this however reduced to 10

students with 1.27% in year two and increased in the 2018/2019 session to 19 students

with 2.09%.

This shows that the pass rate of the students was higher than the failure rate in rural

schools.

Research Question 3: What is the mean difference in the academic performance of

students in business studies in Urban and Rural schools in Edo South Senatorial District?


Table 5: Mean difference of academic performance of students in business studies in

urban and rural located schools for three academic sessions

Location N Mean SD MD

Rural 2607 37.41 2.11

1.39

Urban 15917 36.02 1.76


Results in Table 5 above show that the mean and standard deviation of the rural school

students for the three academic sessions under study were 37.41 and 2.11 while that of

the urban school students was 36.02 and 1.76 respectively. The mean difference between

the two groups was 1.39 in favour of the rural school students. This showed that the rural

school students had a higher academic performance in business studies in Edo South

Senatorial District.

Hypothesis testing

One hypothesis was formulated which guided this study.

Hypothesis 1

There is no significant difference in the academic performance between urban and rural

school students in business studies in Edo State.

The data meant to test the hypothesis are presented in table 6.


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Table 6: Results of independent sample t-test of the difference in students’ academic

performance based on school location for three academic sessions

Location N Mean SD Df t p-

v

a

l

u

e

Remark

Rural 2607 35.11 1.73

185 -

0.523

0.038 Significant

Urban 15917 34.87 1.98

Source: Field Survey, 2019

Results of the independent sample t-test shown in table 6 above show that there is a

significant difference in the academic performance between urban and rural schools

students in business studies in Edo State (p < 0.05, t (198) = 0.523). The number of rural

students was 2607 for the three academic sessions while the number of urban students

was 15917. The mean of rural students indicated 35.11 while urban students showed

34.87. The standard deviation showed 1.73 for rural students while urban students 1.98.

The degree of freedom showed 185. Hence the null hypothesis which states that there is

no significant difference in the academic performance between urban and rural schools

students in business studies in Edo State is rejected while the alternate hypothesis is

accepted.

Discussion of Findings

In view of the results obtained from the presentation and analysis of data, the discussions

of the major findings of the study are as follows:

The result of the analysis of research question 1 as shown in tables 3a, 3b, and 3c

revealed that the performance of students in business studies examination in urban

schools in Edo State was low in the three academic sessions. From the researcher’s point

of view, it may be as a result of the fact that students in urban areas concentrate more on

watching a home video, engaging in social media, going to night parties instead of

concentrating on their studies. The study did not agree with the finding of Ayodele

(1988) who found that students in urban schools perform better than students from a rural

schools in their School Certificate Examination.

The result of the analysis of research question 2 as shown in tables 4a, 4b, and 4c

revealed that the performance of students in business studies examination in rural schools


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in Edo State was high in the three academic sessions. The finding is in consonance with

that of Adekola (2011) which revealed that the level of students’ academic performance

in rural schools was moderately high. This is to say that the geographical location of

schools has an influence on the academic performance of students.

The result of the analysis of research question 3 as shown in table five revealed that the

mean difference of performance of students in business studies examination between

rural and urban schools in Edo State was in favour of rural schools in the three academic

sessions. One can submit that the performance of students in rural schools was better than

that of their counterparts, in urban locations. This outcome revealed that students from

rural schools obtained better mean scores when compared with their counterparts from

urban schools. The above result, therefore, supports the earlier finding of Owoeye (2011)

who reported that the socio-economic well-being of students’ parents has a strong

relationship with students’ academic performance emphasizing that the urban/rural

location of schools appear to outweigh this factor in fixing the academic performance of

the learner and rural students have continually showed improved academic performance.

The test of the hypothesis as shown in table six revealed that there is a significant

difference in the academic performance between urban and rural schools students in

business studies in Edo State. The above result also supports the earlier findings of Obe

(2004) that the academic performance of students in rural communities differed from

those in urban locations. In his contribution on rural/urban differences, Boylan and

Mcswan, (2008) reported that rural schools were inferior and lacked in the range of

facilities; the researcher found that a lot of coaching was done to prepare students for

public examination during the holiday. Thus, promoting the spirit of competition and

rivalry that may be lacking in the rural pupils who probably have limitations in exposure

and experience. But this research is different from others due to the fact that rural

students performed more brilliantly than urban students.

Conclusion

The study concluded that students in rural located schools performed better than their

counterparts in urban schools. Also, there is a significant difference in the performance of

students in business studies between urban and rural located schools in favour of rural

located schools.

Recommendations

The following recommendations are made arising from the findings of this study.

1. Continuous assessment should be given more consideration in urban schools. In

fact, it should not only be made compulsory but it should be used as part of a

yardstick for promotion and not parents' influence.


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2. Parents especially those in the urban areas with low educational levels should

enroll in adult education so as to guide their wards for improved performance.

3. Enabling environment should be provided for teachers while attempting to

increase students’ performance through the provision of instructional materials.

4. Educational planners, curriculum planners, and teachers could use the parent

Teacher Association fora for the reorientation of parents on the relevance of their

keen participation on their wards' academic activities and performance.

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