Examining the effect of the free SHS programme on the Academic outcomes of music students in the senior high schools of Ghana

Abstract

With the implementation of successive government reforms, including the Free Senior High School Programme (FSHS): The 1992 constitution ensures that all Ghanaians have equal access to free education at the pre tertiary level, and with mixed evidence on the extent to which the FSHS policy is influencing the academic achievement of students in the senior high schools, this study aimed to examine the overall effect of the FSHS programme on the academic achievements of students in music, through the exploration of the key tenets of the policy and their correlation to outcomes in music in Ghana. Employing a quantitative mode of enquiry and a multistage sampling technique, this project randomly stratified 30 senior high schools across the Volta and Oti regions of Ghana, which also produced data on 4,612 participants for the study. Both primary and secondary data were collected for analysis, with descriptive and inferential statistical tools used to test the hypotheses of relationships among the variables. The findings revealed that Pearson‟s correlation with an asymptotic significance (2-sided) of 0.001, the FSHS programme has significantly affected students‟ results, with the key pillars of the programme also playing significant roles in students‟ academic outcomes under the FSHS programme. There is therefore ample evidence to believe that the policy is positively influencing music education.