GENDER AND FOUNDATION YEAR OF SCHOOL ON ACADEMIC ACHIEVEMENT OF SECONDARY STUDENTS IN BIOLOGY USING STATE UNIFIED AND EXTERNAL EXAMINATIONS

Abstract

The influence of students’ gender and year school was founded on academic achievement in biology among higher secondary school students in Ogun State, Nigeria, were researched using state unified tests and external examinations. The study used ex-post facto research design. 600 SS 3 students made up the sample, which was drawn using a simple random sampling procedure. Students’ biology grades were derived from both school assessment records and WASSCE results using Academic Performance Data Extract Proforma (APDEP). The mean, standard deviation, index of skewness, t-test, and one-way and two-way ANOVA were used to examine the data. The findings showed that students’ achievement in WASSCE in biology was poor in 2018 (index of skewness = 0.31) and 2019 (index of skewness = 0.26) but high in the state unified examinations for 2018 (index of skewness = -0.20) and 2019 (index of skewness = -0.32). Students’ achievement in WASSCE and state unified examination was however not influenced by both gender and school foundation year. The recommendation among others was that government should not hesitate irrespective of gender to deploy facilities and approaches considered relevant towards improving students’ academic achievement.