PHD- Department of Educational Management Policy & Curriculum Studies.

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Browsing PHD- Department of Educational Management Policy & Curriculum Studies. by Subject "Counties"

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    Elected School Based Inputs and Processes Influence on Performance in Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education in Nyeri and Nyandarua Counties
    (Kenyatta University, 2023) Njenga, Gatama Samwel; Mary A. Otieno; Samuel N. Waweru
    The study purposed to provide empirical data on the status of some selected school inputs and processes as well as account for their specific influence on academic performance in Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education examination performance in public secondary schools in Nyeri and Nyandarua counties. The concern was the large numbers of students with very low grades and the wide performance disparities between schools even of the same category. The objectives of the study were to: i) determine the influence of adequacy and utilization of school physical resources on academic performance in public secondary schools in Nyeri and Nyandarua counties; ii) establish the influence of students’ cognitive entry behavior on academic performance in public secondary schools in Nyeri and Nyandarua counties; iii) establish the influence of teacher qualifications on academic performance in public secondary schools in Nyeri and Nyandarua counties and iv) determine the influence of instructional leadership on academic performance in public secondary schools in Nyeri and Nyandarua counties. The study adopted ex-post facto research design and systems theory using the Context-Inputs -Process-Outputs model to establish the determinants of learning outcomes. The target population for the study was 386 principals ,2316 Heads of Departments and 4160 teachers in 386 schools as well as 2 County Directors of education and 2 County Quality Assurance and Standards Officers. The sample sizes were derived from Kothari formula and constituted 192 principals, 330 Heads of department and 352 teachers in 192 schools as well as 2 County Directors of education and 2 County Quality Assurance and Standards Officers. Main sampling method used were stratified random, Simple random and purposive sampling. Data collection was done by use of Questionnaires and Interview schedules. Qualitative data was analyzed using thematic analysis and mainly presented using narratives while quantitative data was analyzed using descriptive and inferential statistics and was mainly presented using tables and figures. Due to data non-normality and the fact that much of the data was ordinal from Likert scale items, Kruskal-Wallis H- test and Mann-Whitney U-test (non-parametric equivalents of F-test and t-test respectively) were used for testing hypothesis at alpha (α) value of 0.05. Key findings were that there was inadequacy or scarcity of critical physical resources in most schools especially libraries, school halls, computer labs and computers. Most resources were not optimally utilized in most schools yet resource utilization invariably provided higher effect sizes than resource adequacy. Student cognitive entry behavior H (4, N=172) =49.64, P ˂ .001 and instructional leadership H (2, N=172) =28.55, P ˂ .001 were the strongest variables that explained performance variation with largest effective sizes of r2=0.29 and r2=0.167 respectively. Major conclusion is that while schools’ inputs like adequacy of physical resources and teachers need urgent fixing, school processes like optimal resource utilization and instructional leadership equally need to be streamlined and intensified for enhanced performance. Major recommendation is that all schools need to be fairly equipped with critical inputs where adequacy is pegged on population of students enrolled and to focus on key processes so that learning quality is standard in all schools.