Student Engagement- An Assessment and Comparison

Abstract

Though student engagement has earned a considerable attention elsewhere in the world but in India it is still an evolving concept. Engagement as a term is based on the idea of participation, identification and investment. It encompasses all the three behavioral, cognitive and affective components. Every component is equally contributing to the total engagement a student reports in an activity or school. A holistic understanding of student engagement is crucial. Its significance and role in promoting positive and better outcomes is immense, making it extremely essential to be paid special emphasize to and analyze the level or extent to which students are engaged in school related activities or report engagement in their respective schools both at state and national level. The present investigation is an attempt to analyze and assess the student engagement among higher secondary students studying in various government schools in the Kashmir province of Jammu and Kashmir UT. 700 higher secondary school students consisting of (339) rural and (361) urban, made up the sample, selected using the probability sampling technique. The Student Engagement Scale developed and constructed by the researcher was used to collect the data. Moreover, a comparative analysis with regard to gender and residence was performed to compare the groups based on these two demographic variables. Statistical procedures such as Mean, percentage, SD and t-test were employed to analyze the obtained data. The results showed, 23.4% of students fall in the high engagement group, 50.1% were averagely engaged and 26.4% were found in the low student engagement category. Moreover, a significant difference was found in the student engagement level of male and female students. The Mean of female students (M=121.44) was higher as compared to male students (M= 116.71) and the difference between means was significant at .01 level (t= 4.198). However, no significant difference was found in the mean score of students residing in urban and rural areas. Students from both the areas had similar mean score on the student engagement scale.