THE EFFECT OF CLASS SIZE AND OVERPOPULATION ON THE ACADEMIC PERFORMANCE OF SECONDARY SCHOOL STUDENTS

CHAPTER ONE

1.0 INTRODUCTION

1.1 BACKGROUND TO THE STUDY

As school population increases class sizes also increase, the performances of students become an issue. According to Dror (1995), class size has become a phenomenon often mentioned in the educational literature as an influence on pupil’s feelings and achievement, on administration, quality and school budgets. In his words he noted, that class size is almost an administrative decision over which teachers have little or no control. Most researchers start from the assumption that size of the class would prove a significant determinant of the degree of success of students. In fact, with the exception of a few, many studies have reported that under ideal situation, class size in itself appears to be an important factor. The first issue that calls for immediate clarification is what number of students should constitute a large group and what should be described as a small group? In describing a small group, Bray (1990) observed that they have few teachers with small pools of talent; oer limited range of subjects and characteristically finding it hard to justify costly investment on libraries… their pupils lack competition and interest with relatively few peers as they get stocked with same teacher for an entire school career. The description appears to be an anti-type of what obtains in large group. Large school/class size on the other hand are often impersonal, having broader curricula with teachers being given wider support, while students may suffer discipline problems as teachers cannot get to know their students very easily.

They find it easy to stream students according to ability while commitment to work may stand a test of time. In terms of numerical strength, the National Policy on Education (1977 revised in 1981) specified 20 in pre-primary, 30 in primary and maximum of 40 in secondary schools. These directives appear unrealistic in urban areas as a result of high population. From studies conducted, the size of large classes range from 30-336 and small from 8-45 (Kolo, 1991). The empirical literature on class size and its relationship to academic achievement has been unwieldy and confusing. According to Jordan (1964), in his analysis of the interrelationship of intelligence, achievement and socio-economic status of high schools, concluded that School Location among other variables was directly related to mean achievement level of students in all the sampled subjects. However, the report by some researchers on elementary school pupils revealed that the size of school and length of attendance have little or no effect upon pupils’ achievement when educational opportunities are comparable. In his conclusion, he asserted that teachers generally, have definite preference for the size of schools in which they wish to teach and that the larger the size, the lower the level of students’ achievement will tend to be. The observation which agrees with the findings of Sitkei (1968) and Walberg (1969) that a significant and consistent relationship exist in the achievement of students in small classes of about 1-20 pupils that obtained higher scores in science tests than their counterparts in large classes are necessary for student achievement. Numerous studies have investigated the influence of class size on student attitudes, behaviors, and outcomes. The overwhelming majority of these studies have focused on elementary school and even pre-school eects of class size on student achievement. The conventional wisdom among parents, teachers, school administrators, and policy makers is that smaller class sizes translate to improvements in student learning and outcomes. This conventional wisdom, however, has not been universally supported by empirical evidence.

While a number of studies have found support for the importance of class size on student achievement, others strongly refute this claim concluding that class size has little to no impact on objective student outcomes. The difficulties in assessing the causal influence of class size on student outcomes, such as achievement, are; (1) Class size itself is often not directly observed but rather proxy by pupil-teacher ratios at the state, district, or school level, (2) Many data sets used to analyze this question are cross-sectional and thus do not allow one to control for fixed student, teacher, class, or school effects, and (3) Class size itself may be endogenous in a student outcome equation. Nonetheless, the general consensus among researchers examining this issue is that if class size matters at all its influence is most pronounced at the lowest grade levels. Only a handful of studies have focused on the role that class size may play in outcomes in tertiary education. Clearly, the educational environment is dramatically different from the classroom and learning environment of the elementary school setting. Even so the conventional wisdom of the benefits of small class size persists in post secondary education, as well. This intractable perception is so prevalent that class size represents two of the fifteen inputs into the U.S. News and World Report college rankings formula, despite the lack of convincing evidence that class size has a significant impact on student outcomes. Overpopulation refers to a situation where the total number of people in an area exceeds the available resources.

Overpopulation can also be defined as deficiency in resources development in relation to the available people Osuji (2008). This means existing resources cannot march the immediate population number. Evidence has shown that the population of students in urban schools is on the increase. The steady areas to enjoy recreational facilities, which keeps them busy after studying is one of the factors that contributes to overpopulation of secondary schools in urban areas. Under population of secondary school in Nigeria has had a negative impact in the Nigeria educational sector, and the output is devastating in terms of loss of standard and its attendant results. This situation of over population could be speculated to be speculated to be responsible for the untold hardship, corruption, social disorder, poor standard of living, crime et cetera. In this, there will be lower standard of education, inadequate This research will however examine the influence and effect of class size on student academic performance in secondary schools.

1.2 STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM

According to the Federal Ministry of Education, as at 2004, the population of Nigeria secondary schools stood at one hundred and eighteen thousand, two hundred (118200) secondary schools while that of Imo state showed a total number of two hundred and five (205). Owerri Municipal council had about seven (7) secondary schools, with a population of Seven thousand, six hundred and fieen (7615) students. This figure when compared with that of 1999 which was inclusive according to Federal Ministry of Education was very high because during that period, it was so in order to attract Federal Government attention.

The present Nigerian population of secondary schools going by the above number is almost twenty one thousand, eight hundred and twenty eight (21828) secondary schools, with Imo state having three hundred and twelve (312) secondary schools and Owerri Municipal 9 government secondary schools. Over the years, there has been an increase in the population of students in urban secondary schools. This has been consistent, without the attendant increase in facilities, teachers and infrastructure, etcetera. With the decline in the quality of education and output, it therefore becomes imperative to find out whether the increase in population of students’ directly affect their academic performance and identify the causes of increase in population of students in government secondary schools in Owerri educational zone and what could be done to remedy the situation.