Selected educational resources as determinants of academic performance in public secondary schools in Kuria East and Kuria West sub-counties, Kenya

Abstract

The constitution of Kenya commits to providing Kenyan youths with access to quality education. Kenya has committed to achieve goal four of the global Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) which aims to provide inclusive, equitable and quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all by the year 2030. An analysis of Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education performance in Migori County showed that Kuria East and Kuria west sub-counties are always at the bottom of the seven sub-counties with continually declining academic performance from 2012 to date. This study sought to determine the influence of the levels of adequacy and utilization of teachers on learners’ academic performance in Kuria East and Kuria West sub-counties. The objectives of the study were: to determine the influence of the levels of adequacy of teachers on learners academic performance in Kuria East and Kuria West sub-counties; to establish the influence of the level of utilization of teachers on learners’ academic performance in Kuria East and Kuria West sub-counties. The study adopted a descriptive survey research design. The population consisted of 40 principals and 345 teachers. Saturated random sampling technique was used to select 36 principals while stratified random sampling was used to select 138 teachers for the study. Data was collected through questionnaires, document analysis guide and observation checklist. Face and content validity of the instruments was ascertained by supervisors. Quantitative data was analyzed using both descriptive and inferential statistics involving percentages, mean and linear regression and qualitative data using content analysis. Findings indicated that adequacy and utilization of selected educational resources had statistically significant effect on academic performance with a regression coefficient of 0.87 for teachers. The government should employ more teachers to bridge the gap of over 60.58% teacher shortage in Kuria East and 50.1% shortage in Kuria West and ensure that those who are already employed are not overworked. Findings of the study may be useful to Kuria East and Kuria West sub counties, county government of Migori, Teachers Service Commission, educational planners, policy makers, and educational managers to utilize educational resources efficiently and device measures to address shortages of educational resources in schools so as to improve academic performance and to academicians for research purposes.

Keywords: Educational resources, academic performance, teacher utilization, teacher adequacy, efficiency.

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