ACADEMIC INTEREST AS CORRELATE OF ACADEMIC ACHIEVEMENT OF UNDERGRADUATES IN PUBLIC UNIVERSITIES IN ANAMBRA STATE

Abstract

The idea behind the establishment of schools overtime has been to impact knowledge and skills to students. Behind this idea is the goal of enhancing academic achievements among undergraduates in courses that they offer in tertiary institutions. However, observations and the semester academic records from respective departments have shown that while some undergraduates achieve high academically, in some courses offered in tertiary institutions, the academic achievements in courses like GSS 101and CSC 101appear to be on a steady decline. The study therefore looked at academic interest as correlate of academic achievement of undergraduates in Anambra State Public Universities. The public two Universities in Anambra State include: Nnamdi Azikiwe University Awka and Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu University, Uli. Correlation survey research design was adopted for this study to help observe the values of variables such as academic interest, in order to examine the relationship existing between this variable and undergraduate’s academic achievement in GSS 101 and CSC 101. The Stratified random sampling technique was employed such that all the faculties in each of the two Universities that make up the entire university were recognized as strata. Instrument adopted for data collection is the Students’ Academic Interest Scale. The study found a significant positive relationship of r = .148**, P< .01 existing between academic interest and academic achievement of undergraduates in GSS 101 in Anambra State Public Universities; no significant positive relationship of r =. 056, P =.28 exist between academic interest and academic achievement of undergraduates in CSC 101 in Anambra State; The study therefore recommends that Parents should endeavour to increase their efforts in getting involved in the academic interest of their children, and encourage their children to develop academic interest towards their studies especially the science based ones.