Hawking And Its Effects On The Academics Performance Of Secondary Schools Students In Umuahia South Local Government Area Of Abia State

ABSTRACT

This study focused attention on the Hawking and its effects on the Academics performance of secondary schools students in Umuahia South Local Government Area of Abia State as a case study.

Based on the findings of the study, it is revealed that secondary school students in Umuahia South Local Government Area are involved in hawking, that female students participate in the business more than the male counterparts.

The study also shows that the involvement of students in hawking is highly associated with their parents socio-economic background, whereas there is a significant difference between the academic performance of hawkers and non hawkers that is students who hawk perform poorly academically than those who do not hawk.

More so, dangers like motor accidence, lost of life, child abuse, sexual abuse of students, poor academic performance etc has also been attributed to hawking by those students.

Finally, the researcher hence in this study made some recommendations that will help in the remedy of this ugly situation.

CHAPTER ONE

BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY

One of the problems which have over the past decades racked the boat of the Nigeria society is the graduate but steady decay in her educational system as described by Iwe (1992), is in such a pathological state that it seems certain forces, both within and outside the system are in a deliberate alliance to come ensure its total collapse.

A clear manifestation of this deplorable state affairs in the general decline in the standard of education reflected in the unprecedented low level of academic performance among pupils/students at the various level of education commenting on the sharp difference between peoples academic performance today and that in the past few decades.

In some ways, everyone who attended school in thirties/forties agrees that, there is a sharp fall in the level of performance of pupils / students when compared with their counterparts of the thirties/forties. Older people quickly point out that they write better, speak better, and read better than the younger ones now. It is hopeless and sad that the present situation in our school system holders of the primary / first school leaving certificate can hardly write correctly their names, not to talk of writing or spelling simple and correct words.

A number of factors have been blamed for the above ugly trend in our educational system.

Among such factors is the interest of our children in academic work in pursuance to material values.

The values system of many Nigeria has gently changed over they years, and has become materialistic oriented. Today, however, the spirit of materialism and hedonism has and over shadowed over value system. In many cities in our society, opulent and quantity of wealth have been substitute for dignity and quality of human person. It is no longer ones personality, quality a virtue that count, but the volume of wealth no matter how dishonest or unjust the means. This tread has equally influence our children’s. Value conception and perception.

Hence, many school children here in Umuahia South Local Government Area one seen in all moor and crannies of the town roaming the streets, either sent by their parent or guardians or on their own, hawking all manners of commodities, such as pure water, soap, groundnuts, food items, sweet etc. this , they do must often before or soon after school and sometimes during school hours.

While some people believe that hawking by such children has its positive side as it can serve as a source of additional money to augment the small income of poor parents, others argue that the extra money realized from the venture more often than not, motivates the children more, toward money than their studies.

The researcher, however, fears that hawking could expose the school child those conditions, which have the potentials of adversely influencing his devotion to academic in this study.

STATEMENT OF THE STUDY

Hawking, no doubt, affords a cheap means of self employment for the teeming and jobless members of the society, and also serves as a means of livelihood to many poor families. However, there is simple evidence to show that hawking by children exposes them to a lot of hazards such as sexual abuse, sexually transmitted diseases, accidents, emotional trauma and other psychological proplems. It is the researcher view that a proplem such as this deserves a close study in order to find out whether or not it has any significant effect on the childrens academic performance.

PURPOSE OF THE STUDY

The purpose of this study is to investigate the effects of hawking by secondary student in Umuahia South local Government Area on their academic performace. The specific objectives of the study are:

1. To find out extend of the involvement of the second any school students in hawking in Umuahia South L.G.A.
2. To identify which of the sexes that is more involved in hawking than the other among the secondary school students.
3. To determine if involvement of school students in hawking is associated with their parent Socio-economic background in terms of occupation and level of education.
4. To find out if there is any significant difference between the academic performance of school students who hawk and those who do not.

SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY

The result of this study shall be useful to different categories of people or groups of people. It will help to enlighten parents whose children or wards engage in hawking and who were igorant of it effects on their educational career and wellbeing.

This will also help to improve the students over all academic performance  and also boost the teachers moral and job efficiency. Again, the product of this student shall be useful to our policy and lawmakers who will need the information in it for purpose of legislation against lawking by school age children.

RESEARCH QUESTION

To facilities the investigation the following question have been formulated;

1. To what extent are secondary school students in Umuahia South L.G.A. of Abia state involved in hawking?
2. Which of the sexes (male or female students) are more involved in hawking than other.
3. Are students involvement in hawking associated with their parents socio-economic background in terms of level of education and occupation?
4. Is there any significant difference between the academic performance of secondary school students who and those who do not?

SCOPE OF THE STUDY

The study shall be limited to students in senior secondary three in Umuahia South L.G.A. the reason for this decision is that, since students in this class have spent up to six years in school, they are relatively older and more mature than those in lower class. They are therefore preferred by their parents or guardians for use in activities such as hawking to the younger ones.

LIMITATION OF THE STUDY

This work could have been marvelous but for the following constrains. First, there was shortness of time for completion and submission of this project as a research of this wind deserves more time. Secondary inadequate finance constitutes, yet another problem as researcher had in mind to sample more people but inadequate of funds made it relatively difficult.

Pages:  47

Category: Project

Format:  Word & PDF

Chapters: 1-5

Material contains Table of Content, Abstract and References