Influence of Cultural Stereotypes on Academic Performance of Girls' in Co-educational Secondary Schools in Teso North Sub-county, Kenya

Abstract

The Government of Kenya through the Ministry of Education has put in place several measures to help children to access, be retained in schools and complete their education. More schools have been started, existing schools expanded to accommodate more pupils and students and special programmes have been initiated to facilitate girls in accessing education. These efforts have not yielded much fruits; combinations of obsolete cultural stereotypes continue to deny girls their rights to education. Therefore, girls' education remains elusive. This paper is an outcome of a study which sought to determine the influence of cultural stereotypes on the girls' academic performance in public co-educational secondary schools in Teso North sub- county, Kenya. The study was guided by Stereotype Threat Theory by Steel and Aronson in which stereotype threat was assumed to hamper performance of girls who were identified with negatively stereotyped group in society. The study adopted the descriptive survey research design. A sample size of 369 respondents comprising of 355 students, 7 teachers in-charge of counseling, 6 principals of co-educational public secondary schools and 1 Sub County Education Quality Assurance and Standards Officer participated in this study. Proportionate, stratified random, purposive and saturated sampling techniques were used to obtain the required sample size. Two co-educational public secondary schools were used for piloting purpose. Research instruments that were used include questionnaires, interview schedule and document analysis. Validity and reliability of the instruments was established through a pilot study which was carried out in two selected schools. Face, content and construct validity of the instruments was determined through expert judgment while test-retest method was used to test reliability of the instruments. Quantitative data was analyzed through descriptive statistics such as frequency counts, percentages, means, mode, median, graphs and tables. Qualitative data was transcribed and discussed based on ongoing themes. The study revealed that despite concrete effort geared towards supporting girls' education, girls' academic performance was lower than boys and that they were disadvantaged in many aspects including having to walk long distances to school. The findings of this study may help education policy makers, education policy implementers and other stakeholders into finding solutions on minimizing the cultural stereotypes affecting academic performance of girls. The study recommends that stakeholders look at modalities to cut down on fees, provide bursaries and enhance sensitization campaign. The study suggests further research to establish the extent gender-based cultural stereotype influences the academic performance of girls in secondary schools.