A statistical analysis of the impact of Corona Virus 2019 pandemic on the academic performance of bachelor of statistics students: a case study of BSTA finalists 2021

Abstract

This research was designed to make analysis of the impact of COVID19 on the GPA “grade point average”. The findings of the research were based on a sample of 76 BSTA finalist students which was determined by the Yamane’s formula at 5% level of significance. The data collected was analysed in STATA at the univariate, bivariate and multiple regression levels. Conclusions were made on the pooled data of 152 observations and a dummy representing period was created. The results show that there’s significant mean difference between GPA before and GPA during the pandemic (t- value=17.56, p value=0.00), got using the paired sample t test well at 5% level of significance. GPA is significantly and positively influenced by class attendance by coefficient of 0.01(p value 0.01), significantly and negatively influenced by number of retakes by (coef. -0.11 and p value 0.00), significantly and positively influenced by residing from hall by (coef. 0.25 and p value 0.01) and home by (coef. 0.28 and p value 0.01) and also significantly and negatively influenced by period during the pandemic by (coef. -0.39 and p value 0.00). This implies that the number of retakes got decreases GPA, residing in hall increases the GPA and residing from home also increases the GPA at 5% level of significance. The value 17.56 represents the difference of the GPA between the periods before and during without other factors involved well as the value -0.39 represents the difference on GPA between two periods with other factors involved hence shows the effect of the pandemic on the factors that affect the GPA. The recommendations below were made; From the results, residing from hall and home was found to have a significant positive influence on the GPA thus the university should renovate hall and expand them to make it more comfortable for the students and to increase their numbers in the halls. In addition, parents who stay not far away from the university should have their children reside from home from easier monitoring. Furthermore, since increase in the number of retakes leads to a decrease in the GPA. The university should put a maximum number of retakes a person can redo a semester and others can be pushed to the next years to improve on concentration of those students on the semester course units. I also recommend more focus on more training by the university to the students and staff on different online platforms that are used since most lecturer have not been acquainted with them which makes the students biased and fail to attend the online lectures leading to lower class attendances registered.