Volume 14, Issue 1, 2026

Effect of School Location on Students’ Academic Achievement in Biology in Ogoja Education Zone, Cross River State, Nigeria

Ugbe Lishilinimye

Abstract

This study was aimed to find out how school location (urban and rural)
influences students’ academic achievement in Biology in Ogoja Education
Zone, Cross River State, Nigeria. The research design adopted for the study is
the quasi-experimental non-randomised factorial design, using a pretestposttest control group for this study. The population consisted of all senior
secondary school one (SS 1) Biology students in the 85 public secondary
schools in Ogoja Education Zone. While the sample for the study comprised
220 Senior Secondary One (SS1) Biology students drawn from six secondary
schools through a simple random sampling technique (118 from urban and 102
from rural locations) Biology Achievement Test (BAT) with 50 multiplechoice questions was the instrument for data collection, administered to the
220 students across their different schools. The reliability of the instrument
was obtained to be 0.88 using the Kuder Richardson formula (KR-20). An
independent t-test analysis was used for data analysis. The result showed that
the calculated t-cal value was 8.20, while the critical table value was 1.96;
therefore, there is a significant difference in the mean scores achieved in
Biology between rural and urban secondary school one students. The
difference is in favour of urban schools. It was concluded that students in the
urban areas performed academically better than their rural counterparts. It was
then recommended, among others, that schools in rural areas should similarly
and adequately be provided with the necessary learning facilities, such as wellequipped laboratories with qualified and committed teachers for effective
teaching and learning of Biology in the area.

Keywords

School location, Students’ academic achievement, Biology learning facilities, rural and urban secondary schools

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