MANAGEMENT PRACTICES FOR CURBING SECONDARY SCHOOL STUDENTS’ APATHY TO IN-SCHOOL EXTERNAL EXAMINATIONS IN ANAMBRA STATE
ABSTRACT
The study investigated the management practices for curbing secondary school students’ apathy to in-school external examinations in Anambra State. Descriptive survey research design was adopted for the study. Four research question and four hypotheses were structured to guide the study. Population of the study comprised 512 respondents which included all the principals and in-school external examination officers in all public secondary schools in Anambra State. The researcher made use of the entire population for the study since its deemed manageable. Questionnaire instrument titled “Management Practices for Curbing Students’ Apathy to In-School External Examinations Questionnaire (MSCSAIEEQ) was used in collection of data for the study. The instrument was duly validated by three experts; two in Educational Management and one in Measurement and Evaluation, all from Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu University Igbariam Campus. Cronbach Alpha (α) method was used to determine the internal consistency and reliability of the items in the sections of the instrument. The reliability coefficient value of 0.8 was obtained and this was considered adequate for the study. Data collected were analysed using mean ratings while hypotheses that guided the study were tested using t-test statistics at 0.05 significance level. Findings of the study showed that educational policies, administrative practices and counseling practices are effective and would be significantly helpful in curbing secondary school students’ apathy to in-school external examinations, while legal measures were found to be effectively low and have a little or no significant in helping to curb secondary school students’ apathy to in-school external examinations. The findings imply that, for effective management of students’ apathy to in-school external examination, only the use of educational policies, administrative practices, as well as counselling practices can deter students from engaging in in-school external examinations, while the use of legal measures would not help in curbing the challenges encountered in in-school examinations. Recommendations were appropriately made, amongst which are, that government should endeavour to review and improve its policy documents on educational administration in order to address policies that would help in deterring students in engaging in in-school external examinations in Anambra State. It was also recommended that government should also endeavour to make laws that are people friendly and discouraging but not laws that are weak and intimidating which could be easily breached in curbing secondary school students’ apathy to in-school external examinations.
