Abstract

This piece of work entitled The Effects of Social Environment on Secondary School Students’ Academic Achievement in Buea Sub Division South West Region of Cameroon. This research was aimed at finding out how social environment affects secondary school students’ academic achievement.

The study had some specific objectives like; to determine how the family affects students’ academic achievement in secondary schools in Buea Sub Division, to examine the effects of the community on secondary school students’ academic achievement in the Buea Sub Division to determine how peer groups can influence secondary school student academic achievement and to examine the effects the school environment has on secondary school students’ academic achievement. In order to achieve the objective of this research, the objectives were converted to questions and questionnaires were designed to gather data.

The literature was reviewed based on the conceptual review, theoretical review and the empirical review in which the researcher reviewed theories like Urie Bronfenbrenner Ecological System theory (1979) social self-discrepancy theory by Heggins (1997), Kurt Lewin (1947) dynamic theory of personality and Albert Bandura (1977) social learning theory.

The research design adopted for this work is the quantitative research design using the survey research method. The target population of the study constituted students of G.H.S Buea, GHS Buea Town and Inter Comprehensive High School. It was recommended that the community, family, peer group and the type of school milieu that is conducive contributes greatly to student academic achievement.

CHAPTER ONE

GENERAL INTODUCTION

Background of the Study

The study will be looking at four main backgrounds that is historical, contextual, conceptual, and theoretical backgrounds.

One of the most discussed issues in the learning environment is the issues of social environment and students’ academic achievement. Social environmental could be defined as the immediate physical and social setting in which people live or in which something happens or develops (Ngwoke, 2005). In general, the social environment of a student enhances his/her academic achievement. Students learn by observation which is either positive or negative. There are four main backgrounds Historical, Contextual, Conceptual and Theoretical backgrounds. The construct of social environment can be traced far back 100 years (Perry, 1908). The scientific study of social environment was not done until 1950 with the birth of school environment. The attempts of March and Simon (1958) and Agyris (1958) continued as they tried to correlate the influences of organizational environment to morale, productivity and turnover. The research continued till 1960 and early 1970s (Meyers and Riugsby 1967). By late 1970s, researchers were trying to associate social environment and students’ academic achievement. In this the greatest indicator of achievement is the way students feel about themselves within the social environment. The ecological system theory positions human development within the systems of super-imposed layers of environmental settings; each impacting differently on human development (Bronfonbrenner 1991-1997). Ever since and now, researchers have attempted to link social environment to different outcomes like family crisis, societal issues, group influence. The social environment has a great influence on students’ academic achievement. It is believed that a well- structured community, family, and school milieu will gear up outcomes political, economic and effective teaching and learning process and academic achievement of students. With the school milieu, a teacher can only focus on one student at a time when he/she has divided attention amongst many students in a classroom. It is not possible for one teacher to give equal attention and time to all the students especially in a class of over 50 students as they will need. This can be due to limited resources. A school in Buea Sub Division, South West Region of Cameroon is the context in which the research will focus is a good example.

Williams, Persuade and Turner (2008) while quoting Marden (2005) reported that, safe and orderly school environment, classroom are significantly related to students’ academic achievement. The above researchers (Williams, Persuade and Turner) also quoted Glassman (1994) that a comfortable and caring environment amongst others help in contributing to students’ academic achievement. A variety of physical characteristics of the environment have diverse effects on the teacher-learners’ academic achievement, peer – peer learning and the learning process as a whole. A noisy community, unstable families, un-conducive classrooms, inadequate school infrastructure will affect students’ academic achievement. In school milieu, poor ventilation systems, lead to poor health among teachers and students, absenteeism from students leads to their poor academic achievement (Frazier 2002), Lyons (2001), Ostendorf (2001). The construction of factories and opening of bars close to schools etc. will cause a distraction to students’ learning leading to poor academic achievement. These factors contribute to students’ attitude during the learning process.

Beyond the direct effects that poor facilities have on students’ abilities to learn, the poor construct of the community, the family will also contribute to the learning abilities of the students. It is very possible that the above characteristics of school facilities, the community, the family and peer/group influence, has an effect on secondary school students’ academic achievement. Previous studies have investigated the relationship of poor school environment to poor community structure, the family, the location of schools, teachers’ ratio to students, school population, family issues, classroom ventilation, inconsistent temperatures in the classroom with students’ health problems students behaviour and their academic achievement; Crandell and Smaldino (2001); Davis (2001); Johnson (2001); Lyons (2001); Tanner (2000); Moore (2002); Strichez (2000). This study will examine the aforementioned areas of social environment as it affects students’ academic achievement in Cameroon schools, Buea Sub Division most especially.

The social environment is a most powerful learning situation in which the family, more especially parent, acts as an educator. Sharna and Void (2005) states that the family is a place in which; the whole range of human experience takes place. (Younish and Smollar, 2005) also stated that it is what parents do in the home that counts for learning development of children. It goes without saying that lack of encouragement, low quality of parental involvement and lack of stimulating activities in the home will reduce the homes effectiveness as a learning environment. According to (Feldman and Wentzel, 2000), home environment shows generally stronger relationship to cognitive development. Several researchers (McCullough, Ashbridge, and Peg, 2004) have found relationships between social environment and academic achievement. Children who have received good social environment and positive attitudes from parents can academically perform well. Parents are different from one another, both in their relationships with their own children and their feelings and reactions towards schooling of their children.

Statement of Problem

The academic achievement of students is dependent on their social  environment. Their social environment (family, school, community, church, social groups, peer groups) etc will determine their academic outcomes- positively or negatively. Every successful academic achievement is expected to have an improved social environment.

But some schools in Buea, South West Region do not have a good social environment when viewed from the way of life of students, social behaviour of students, their choices of peer group associations, their desire for attending classes; which has a significant effect on their academic achievement especially during examination or students’ performance assessment.

Secondly, there have been a series of studies related to students’ academic performance but only a few have been related to social environment and students’ academic achievement. It is to this regard that the research is aimed at examining social environment and its effects on secondary school students’ academic achievement, using some secondary schools in Buea sub division as the case study.

Objectives of the Study General Objective

The main aim of the research work is to examine social environment and students’ academic achievements in secondary schools in Buea sub division.

Specific Objective

1. To determine how the family affects students’ academic achievement in secondary schools in Buea.
2. To examine the effects of the community on secondary school student’s academic achievement in the Buea.
3. To determine how peer groups can influence secondary school student’s academic achievements
4. To examine the effects, the school environment has on secondary school students’ academic achievements.

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