Factors influencing student's academic performance during Covid-19 pandemic at Makerere University

Abstract

The main objective of the study was to assess the factors influencing the academic performance of the students during the covid-19 pandemic at Makerere University.The specific objectives of the study were to; assess the relationship between demographic characteristics and academic performance during covid-19 pandemic, determine the relationship between socio-economic characteristics and academic performance during covid-19 pandemic, determine the relationship between attitudes towards online learning and students’ academic performance during covid-19 pandemic and to make policy recommendations for overcoming the challenges faced by students as a result of the covid-19 pandemic. Primary data was used and it was collected using online questionnaires from a sample of 210 undergraduate students at Makerere University. The analysis was done using frequency distribution, summary statistics, chi square test and logistic regression. From the study, it was revealed that majority of the students (83.33%) had declined in academic performance during online learning with reference to traditional face to face mode of learning. It was found that the factors that influenced students’ academic performance were; university preparedness for online learning, internet connectivity, online learning affordability, training for online learning and how conversant the students were with the online approaches used for learning, whose p-values were less than 0.1 (p<0.1). Further, students who were conversant with the approaches used for online learning were 3.07 times more likely to improve in their academic performance during online learning environment than those who were not conversant with the approaches used for online learning (OR=3.067). Those who received training were 68.17 times more likely to improve in their academic performance than those who did not receive any training for online learning (OR=68.174). Results from this study suggest effective training on the different online platforms as well as construction of on campus training facilities to enable easy access of learning materials which might lead to improvement in the students’ academic performance.