An Evaluation of Principals’ Supervisory Practices on Academic Performance in Mathematics among Secondary School Students in Rivers State

Abstract

The study was to an evaluation of principals’ supervisory practices on academic performance in mathematics among secondary school students in Rivers State. Four hypotheses were formulated to guide the study. The study adopted the survey design on a population of 268 public senior secondary schools and 31,945 senior secondary two (SSII) students. A sample size of 810 senior secondary two students was selected via the multi-stage sampling technique. The instrument for data collection was a test titled “Students’ Academic Performance Test in Mathematics (SAPTM)”. The test was validated by experts and subjected to a test re-test reliability index of .89. The analysis was done using Paired Sample t-test with aid of IBM Statistical Package for Social Science (SPSS) version 26.0. The results revealed that, all the variables appeared strongly statistically significant: The p-value is less than the chosen alpha value or significance level (p < 0.05). In conclusion the study indicated that, there is a significant influence of principals’ supervisory practices on academic performance in mathematics among secondary school students in Rivers State. Thus recommendations were that: Principals should regularly conduct classroom observations to monitor teaching practices and provide constructive feedback to teachers; Principals should implement strict policies to ensure teachers consistently attend their lessons; Principals should regularly review and scrutinize teachers' schemes of work to ensure they are comprehensive and aligned with curriculum standards and Principals should schedule regular conferences with teachers to discuss instructional strategies, classroom challenges, and student progress.