Girls perform better academically than boys – report

A RECENT study has found that there is a huge gap between boys and girls in academic performance at tertiary institutions.

According to a report of the study which focused on gender disparity in Namibia in academic achievement, statistics suggest that on average, Namibian secondary school girls performed better academically than boys.

The report was presented in the National Council by Namibia University of Science and Technology (Nust) director of international relations, Marius Kudumo on Monday.

The presentation is part of an agreement signed between the National Council and the two leading universities in Namibia, which aims at assisting lawmakers in coming up with informed policies.

The research is being undertaken jointly by Nust and the University of Namibia (Unam).

“Among other research areas, the study is about finding out what gender-related, cultural, economic, curriculum-based, quality of education, inclusive education and political factors influence Namibian male students or pupils’ underachievement and under-participation in education,” Kudumo recounted.

He pointed out that the main outcome of the study will be an amicable solution which will assist boys to stop dropping out of school, and support them in order to enhance the quality of their educational attainment.

“This type of disparity also exists at tertiary education institutions such as Unam and Nust, where more than two-thirds of

graduates over the years have been female,” he said.

Kudumo, who is also the head of this research project, said although at the beginning of the educational process there are more boys than girls enrolled in Grade 1, there are progressively more girls than boys enrolled in the system from Grade 6 to Grade 12.

Unam statistics on enrolment by gender between 1992 and 2017 show that 35% of students were male and 65% were female, while at Nust, in 2018 alone, out of 2 622 graduates, 1 170 were male and 1 452 female.

Kudumo explained that with the financial support from Unam, the study has commenced, and research data has been collected from pupils, teachers and parents in the Kavango East, Oshana, Oshikoto, //­Kharas, Hardap, and Erongo regions.

However, despite Unam’s financial input in the project, an amount of N$150 000 is still required to cater for logistics resource costs, he added.

– Nampa

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