Parental Influence On Academic Performance In Public Primary Schools In Nakuru North District,Nakuru County, Kenya

ABSTRACT

Education is a key factor to the development of any nation in the world. It has been the intension of the government that all KCPE candidates join secondary schools. Since 2003, the government has been providing funds to all public primary schools to promote access and education standards in all parts of the country. However, quite a number of public primary schools have been performing poorly in KCPE. In Nakuru North District, the average KCPE performance in 2011 was 222.5 marks. The problem is that parents seem to have a lot of influence in pupils’ academic performance in public primary schools. The study was guided by the general system theory which is based on the work of a biologist Ludwing van Bartalanify and social system theory. The purpose of the study was to investigate the parental influence on academic performance in public primary schools in Nakuru North District. The objectives of the study were therefore to establish parental roles, parental economic factors, cultural practices and parental background influencing academic performance in public primary schools in Nakuru North District. A descriptive survey was used in the study. The target population was 40 public primary schools. There were 8 public primary schools headed by female teachers and 32 public primary schools headed by male teachers. The 25% used to select both female and male head teachers would match with that used to determine the sample size. The two primary schools headed by female teachers and the eight primary schools headed by male teachers were selected among 8 and 32 primary schools respectively by systematic (or interval) sampling. The district had 800 teachers with an average of 20 teachers per school. There were 2960 standard 8 pupils with an average of 74 pupils per school. Purposive sampling was used to select the head teacher in each sampled primary school. The researcher selected 20% of both teachers (4) and standard 8 pupils (14). Different questionnaires were administered to the head teachers, teachers and standard 8 pupils. The researcher administered the questionnaires personally after piloting. The instruments were piloted in two primary schools to test degree of their reliability using test re-test method. The two primary schools used in the piloting were not included in the actual study. After the quantitative data was collected, it was analyzed using descriptive statistics and presented in tables. The following were the findings of the study: There are parental roles which affect the academic performance of pupils. Also, economic factors and cultural practices among parents adversely affect academic performance. Parental back ground also affects pupils’ academic performance. In conclusion, parental roles like meeting attendance, disciplining pupils, control of absenteeism, cultivation of respect for teachers and parents being role models have not been played well by parents. These affect academic performance of pupils. Economic factors like ability to pay fees, ability to supplement reading materials by parents, presence of child labour at home and provision of basic needs to pupils affect academic performance. Cultural practices like FGM, early marriages and attitude towards education also affect academic performance. The back ground of parents also affects the academic performance. The following recommendations were made: Parents should always discourage absenteeism of pupils from school, respect for teachers should be cultivated by parents to enhance learning, parents should be educated on the need to create a conducive home environment for their children and pupils should not be abused at home to promote learning.