Republic of the Philippines

SORSOGON STATE COLLEGE

SCHOOL OF GRADUATE STUDIES
Sorsogon City

5 ISSUES/PROBLEMS
INVOLVING STATISTICS
IN THE FIELD OF
EDUCATION
Prepared by:

JOSEPH G. ESCOBER
MAED-FILIPINO

Submitted to:
DR. TARCELA DETERA
Professor

The word statistics in our everyday life means different things to

different people. To a football fan, statistics are the information about rushing
yardage, passing yardage, and first downs, given a halftime. To a manager of
a power generating station, statistics may be information about the quantity
of pollutants being released into the atmosphere. To a school principal,
statistics are information on the absenteeism, test scores and teacher
salaries. To a medical researcher investigating the effects of a new drug,
statistics are evidence of the success of research efforts. And to a college
student, statistics are the grades made on all the quizzes in a course this
semester.
Each of these people is using the word statistics correctly, yet each
uses it in a slightly different way and for a somewhat different purpose.
Statistics is a word that can refer to quantitative data or to a field of study.
As an educator, I found not only a variance in the meaning of the word
from other field but also of the problems involving statistics in the field of
education. Here are some of them:
1. Populations and samples
a) Sample
does
not
represent
characteristics of the population.

the

general

There have been studies made lately for the purpose of

uplifting the quality of the field of education and were
conducted in central schools. We must take note that a
sample is a subset of data selected from a population.
Although the said central schools are part of the whole
population of a district or division, they do not necessarily
have the general characteristics of the whole population of
students/pupils within a district/division. For this matter,
the result of the study may only favor those from central
schools and not the whole population of students in the
district.
b) Researchers are very subjective
Some researchers already picture out the result of their
studies prior to the conduct of the research. Thus, they are
subjective not only in choosing what the study will be
about but also in the chosen recipient of the studies.
2. Obsolete statistical tools in assessing performances
Although the Philippine Education have been trying its best
to meet the technologically-based quality of education it

has been aiming for, the fact is the tools used by teachers
and administrators in assessing student performances
have been outdated. The national planners have been poor
in updating these systems and acted poorly in the results
of studies and number reflectors.
3. Teachers dont have updated knowledge in the
innovations in analysis of data gathered.
Computer softwares for statistical analysis
Many real problems have so much data that doing the
calculations by hand is not feasible. For this reason, most realworld statistical analysis is done on computers. You must prepare
the input data and interpret the results of the analysis and take
appropriate action, but the machinedoes all the number
crunching. There are many widely-used software packages for
statistical analysis but the only most-handy program is Microsoft
Excel which still, some educators are not familiar with.
4. Fabricated results
Since results of statistical measurements and studies
reflects either poor, high, or average performance of a school,
district, or division, some educators tend to fabricate results to
favor them. These also affect the outcome of the study as well as
the interventions conducted based on the results.