Muthengi, Deborah M.2025-06-172025-06-172024-05https://ir-library.ku.ac.ke/handle/123456789/30223A Research Project Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Award of the Degree of Masters of Education (Educational Psychology), Kenyatta University, May, 2024 Supervisor: 1.Anthony IreriDespite increased enrollment following FPE, primary school education has continued to face the challenge of many pupils not completing school in Kenya. In Tharaka Nithi, particularly, Tharaka North Sub County, the issue of pupils not completing school is worrisome as reflected by educational statistics from area. Failure to complete school poses a considerable challenge not only to the individual pupil but also to the Kenyan society at large. Academic engagement is becoming an increasingly debated concept for conceptualizing learners’ educational success. Relevant studies that have concentrated on pupils’ characteristics such as academic engagement and its connection to pupils’ decision to quit school are particularly scarce. Therefore, this study aimed to investigate the link between academic engagement and intention to complete school among primary school pupils in Tharaka Nithi County. Guided by social cognitive theory and using correlational design this study targeted all the 12,250 pupils in the 63 primary schools in Tharaka North Sub-County. A stratified sample of 295 pupils in class six, seven and eight filled the questionnaires. Research instruments were piloted using a sample of 60 pupils from one school that was exempted during the actual data collection period. Data were analyzed using both descriptive and inferential techniques. The results revealed a significant positive moderate correlations between cognitive academic engagement (r (285) = 0.50, p < 0.01), behavioural academic engagement (r (285) = 0.40, p >0.01), emotional academic engagement (r (285) = .39, p < .01) and school completion intention of pupils in upper classes. Regression analysis revealed that cognitive, behavioral and emotional dimensions of academic engagement significantly predicted school completion intention (F (3, 281) = 38.60, P = .00), and they jointly accounted for 29% of variability in school completion intention. Cognitive academic engagement had the greatest weight followed by behavioural academic engagement and with emotional academic engagement having a non-significant contribution to school completion intention. It was concluded that pupils’ academic engagement is significant in explaining and predicting primary school pupils’ intention to leave school. Therefore, schools and stakeholders in general should come up with interventions targeted at improving pupils’ academic engagement so as to raise their intention to complete school.enThesis