Factors Affecting Pupils’ Academic Performance in Public Primary Schools in Kiboga District: A Case Study of Kiboga Town Council

ABSTRACT The purpose of the study was to evaluate the factors affecting pupils’ academic performance in public primary schools in Kiboga to~n council. The study was conducted in that particular area because in the past five years, pupils’ performance in the schools has been alarmingly deteriorating. Specifically, the study was intended to achieve the following objectives: (1) to investigate the extent to which parent involvement affects academic performance of pupils in public primary schools, (2) to analyze the attributes of teachers towards pupils’ academic performance in public primary schools and (3) to suggest measures on how to improve on pupil’s academic perforthance in public primary schools. The study adopted a cross-sectional survey research design. Quantitative and qualitative approaches of data collection were employed. A total of 60 respondents constituted the sample of the study. These included 30. teachers and 30 parents from the four schools (Kiboga DASS, St Andrews P/S, Bamusuuta P/Sand Islamic center primary schools. The researcher used four types of research instruments: namely questionnaires, interviews and observation. The results revealed that; parents are unconcern abOut the education of their pupils thus resulting into poor performance in KDPPS, there is no close contact between teachers and parents, The study also showed that there is only one teacher per subject in KDPPS and pupils are not given career guidance on specific subjects that they handled yet most of the teachers want to assess them through discussions at school. Most of the PPS in KD, school administration merely pays attention to the internal pro~ess of the school such as instructional approaches and school structure. It was also showed that the school administration should be Caring out meetings with student’s leaders to talk about the issues concerning students and that pupils are motivated in different occasions. The conclusions were; the support given to pupils by parents on academic related matters is not enough. The parents/teachers interface is a critical meeting ground for mutual support and understanding or for mutual distrust. The time parents want pupils to be doing domestic work leaving out the homework, assignments and other school requirements is still a big problem 2 • among students. The career guidance on specific subjects handled by their children is not offered yet most of the teachers, want to assess the performance of pupils through discussions. Iviost of the parents are not concerned on issues concerning academic work. Teachers are still lacking in KDPPS where there is only one teacher allocated per subject. The quality of teacherstudent . interaction is an important dimension of the school, experiences that impact students’ performance in schools. The large class size observed in PPS in many low-income countries (e.g. one teacher ‘for more than eighty) are not conducive to adequate learning. The absolute number of teachers also remains problematic in most public primary {PPSJ schools in Kiboga District. The recommendations were that; Public primary schools should keep the government updated o.n the issues going on with their school programs. This will help the government to monitor UPE schools, in order to improve the performance of pupils in (public primary schools) PPS, Parents should always allow their children to do homework and also communicate to their teachers on issues concernin~ academic work, the government should make sure that teachers are enough in these rural Public primary schools and the whole country at large and that the government together with education standards agencies should make sure that teachers are well trained. In addition to the pedagogy, teachers’ trainees should be exposed to more content areas in specific subjects.