20163281 – MARKINOVA, Cassandra

How many people were in the study?

Overall, there were fifty people in the study. There were

twenty-nine (58.00%) Second Year students, and twenty-one
(41.00%) were Third Year students.

When did you do the study?

The study was first conducted on the 22/02-2018, and

concluded on the 23/03/2018 – approximately one month
later. A majority of responses however, were recorded
between 01/03/2018 and 09/03/2018 – with six additional
responses added between 12/03/2018 and 32/03/2018.

What KLAs were people from?

The KLAs do not appear to be present within the available

data, however KLAs include English, H.S.I.E, Mathematics,
Economics/Business Studies, Religion and Drama.

What are your findings/What did your research uncover?

The researched uncovered a variety of factors, including

most common reasons as to why students do not attend
lectures, whether or not students believe the tutorials
and lectures and mandatory, whether students prefer
content to be uploaded online, reasons why students enjoy
(or do not enjoy) going to lectures and how many lectures
on average a student might miss in a given semester.

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How many lectures do students miss on average each
semester?

According to the study, twenty-one students (42.00%)

report that they attend all lectures, whereas twenty-nine
students (58.00%) report having missed at least one
lecture. Twenty-five students (50.00%) report missing one
or more lecture per semester, whereas four students
(8.00%) report missing three or more. No students in the
survey claimed to miss more than five lectures.

What factors impact upon a student’s decision not to

attend a lecture?

Factors include but are not limited to: time it takes a

student to travel and the location, from which they are
required to travel, work commitments, illnesses and other
unforeseen commitments, university commitments and “bad”
teaching methods. Other factors not listed might include,
disagreement/disengagement with ethos of course,
dissatisfaction with the level of work or the complexity
of the work, general dissatisfaction with university,
social or learning difficulties and personal environment
preferences.

What are students’ perceptions of attending lectures?

Students list a variety of reasons as to why they attend

lectures. These reasons include:
- Information given in lectures. (13)
- Engagement with the lecturer and/or students. (17)
- Class discussion. (3)

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 - Good lecturers (only). (1)
- Feeling productive. (2)
- Independent learning. (1)
- Asking questions. (2)
- Being on top of content. (2)
- Structure through environment/physical attendance. (6)
- Mandatory. (1)
- N/A (2)

TOTAL RESPONSES = 50
MOST COMMON RESPONSE = Engagement with lecturer/students (17)
PERCENTAGE: 17/50 = 34.00%
NON-RESPONSES = 2
PERCENTAGE = 4.00%

Should we offer online lectures?

- Content should be/is available online. (11)

- Yes. (32)
- No. (2)
- Maybe. (5)

RANGE OF REASONS:
- (NO) Students would not attend non-mandatory classes.
- (YES) Revision purposes.
- (MAYBE) Only if content is self-explanatory.
- (YES) Absences.
- (YES) Content can be difficult to follow.
- (YES) Travel time.
- (YES) Other commitments.
- (YES) Lecturers just read off screens.
- (YES) Self-directed study preferred.
- (ONLINE CONTENT) Different learning needs.
- (YES) Sometimes falls asleep in class.

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What are your recommendations?

It is difficult to say in modern times, as students are

pre-disposed to technology and therefore innately
distracted and unable to engage with content for long
periods of time. At the same time, too much freedom in
online course content is cause for distraction and
complacency. Based on the data collected from the survey,
it would be best for the university to run a physical
lecture for those who learn best in attendance, while
uploading it for those who are unable to attend. Some
form of student recognition should be enforced be this
the case, i.e. a “completion” button so Lecturers know
which students have engaged with the content remotely,
and those who haven’t.

One student (2.00%) claimed poor pedagogy as the number

one incentive of not attending class, whereas twenty-
three students (46.00%) expressed total satisfaction with
their lecturer by placing ‘dissatisfaction’ as their last
preference. Twenty-six (52.00%) of students listed
dissatisfaction with pedagogy as a preference of 2-5;
indicating some level of dissatisfaction amongst 54.00%
of the recorded cohort. It may therefore be necessary to
evaluate the reasons as to why students are either
satisfied and dissatisfied with the teaching, considering
aspects of the lectures they enjoy – and those they don’t
enjoy (evident in ‘Should lectures/content be online?’).