TEACHER QUALITY AND STUDENT'S ACADEMIC PERFORMANCE IN SECONDARY SCHOOLS IN BAYELSA STATE

Abstract

The study investigated teacher quality and secondary school students’ academic performance in Bayelsa State. Two research questions and two (2) null hypotheses guided the study. The design of the study was a correlational survey. The population of the study comprised all six thousand, eight hundred and ninety-three (6893) teachers and ninety-six thousand, eight hundred and ninety-three students (96893) in the 217 public senior secondary schools in Bayelsa State as of the time of the study. A sample of 1156 respondents comprising 499 teachers and 657 students was used in the study. The instruments used for data collection were the “Teacher Quality Checklist (TQC)”, and the “Students Academic Performance Checklist” developed by the researcher and validated by experts. The reliability of the instrument was established using the Cronbach Alpha formula and the aggregate reliability coefficient
for the Teacher Quality Checklist (TQC) was 0.85 and 0.81 for the Students Academic Performance Checklist. The research questions were answered using Pearson Product Moment Correlation (PPMC), while the hypotheses were tested using a z-test of the significance of the correlation coefficient at 0.05 level of significance. It was revealed that the extent to which teachers’ instructional skills and
knowledge of subject matter influenced students’ academic performance in secondary schools was high. Hence the study concluded that without qualified competent teachers, it is impossible to build a highquality education. Based on the conclusion, it was recommended that to provide a high-quality education, the Government should be committed to ensuring that every student has the opportunity to learn from a qualified and inspiring teacher.