Staff-students’ ratio and education quality of undergraduate programme in the University of Ibadan

Abstract

This study, which was anchored on the UNESCO quality education framework and quantity-quality trade-off theory,  considered the StaffStudents’ Ratio (SSR) in undergraduate programme in the University of Ibadan (UI) as it relates to  and explains quality education. The descriptive research design was adopted for this study. The multi-stage procedure  was used to sample participants 703 of the 15,157 undergraduate students. The two validated instruments used for data  collection were: the Life Skills Acquisition Scale (r = 0.76), which measured the education quality of undergraduates  students and the Undergraduate Enrolment and Staff Strength Template, to collect secondary data on  SSR from the Academic Planning Unit. Four research questions were answered using descriptive statistics and four  hypotheses were tested at P < 0.05 level of significance using inferential statistics. Findings revealed that education  quality received by undergraduate students of the University of Ibadan was very good with overall average performance  of 70. Also, There was no significant difference (P > 0.05; tcal = 1.27 < tcrit = 1.96) between male and female  undergraduate students in UI as regards the education quality received. In the same vein, there was no significant difference (P > 0.05; tcal = 0.06 < tcrit = 1.96) between 300 and 400 levels students in UI as regards the  education quality received. Furthermore, findings showed that there was a significant difference (P < 0.05; tcal = |3.66| >  tcrit = 1.96) between NUC recommended SSR for undergraduate programmes and current SSR in undergraduate  programme in UI. The SSR in UI was far lesser than the NUC recommended SSR. ( UI = 10.38 and NUC = 21.56,). Finally,  the SSR in undergraduate programme in UI had no significant influence (F(1, 14) = 2.24, P > 0.05) on quality education. It  was concluded that, students-teacher ratio in University of Ibadan, despite being lower than the NUC benchmark and  having a negative relationship with education quality in the institution, was not an explanation for the high education  quality in the institution – a situation, which may be peculiar to UI and therefore raising the need for a nationwide study.  Therefore, it was recommended that, UI should sustain and consolidate on its current efforts in maintaining a  low SSR as well as revise it curriculum to improve the inculcation of life skills such as communication and problem  solving. Also, more effort is needed to improve education quality in the institution, as an average performance of 70  indicates that there is more work to be done. Finally, there is need for a further study to ascertain the actual proportion  of graduates that are of low quality and their institutional distribution across the country as well as factors that could  explain this low quality.