Exploring the Difference in Academic Performance Determinants between Public and Private Junior High Schools

Abstract

Despite improvements in basic education accessibility in public schools throughout time, there are worries regarding the lower Basic Education Certificate Examination (BECE) performance of students in public schools when compared with the performances of private schools. The current study sought to establish if there is, the differences in academic performance indicators between private and public junior high schools (JHS). The study focused on the Effutu Municipality following the establishment of the lower performance of public JHS students in literature. The study employed a quantitative approach with a cross-sectional survey design to sample JHS teachers in the Municipality. The study used a questionnaire to collect data from a sample of 385 teachers who were chosen by quota sampling. Teacher professional practice (TP), schools’ resource endowment (SR), instructional supervision (IS), school time usage (ST), teacher motivation (TM), and parental support (PS) were considered as the determinants of academic performance in the study. It was revealed that private schools scored higher in terms of the indicators of academic performance, except for ST where equal variances were established for either school type. Statistically significant differences between established with the Mann-Whitney U test were found for all indicators except as well for ST. the study recommends that there should be efforts to boost-motivate public Junior High Schools teachers, and also consider subsidization over free public schools to generate funding for school resourcing.