Abstract:
The purpose of the study was to compare and ascertain whether participation or non participation in sports has any influence on the academic performance of OFCE students.
The study was intended also to find out whether there would be any difference between
the academic performance of female student- athletes compared to non female student athletes and lastly to study whether there would be differences between male student athletes compared to malenon student- athletes. Forty student- athletes were purposively
selected from among the college’s student- athlete population of 124 from the Ashanti/
Brong-Ahafo (ASHBA) team and stratified random sampling was used to select a sample
of160 from a population of975 non students- athletes in the college. The non student athletes were divided into Diploma in Basic Education A- Diploma in Basic Education H
separately and then, by random number method of the simple random sampling each
student was given the chance to be chosen. The study adopted causal comparative
research design with independent t- test as the statistical technique at a significant level of
0.05 of two tailed to answer four research questions and one hypothesis. Students mean
cumulative GPA score was used to answer three questions and a sixteen item
questionnaire with reliability co-efficient of 0.79 was used to answer one research
question. The findings revealed that students have good reasons for playing sports and do
not see playing sports to be affecting their academic performance. However, students
who play sports for the college were sometimes disadvantaged because they at times get
too tired or miss lectures playing sports for the college. There was slight difference in the
mean cumulative GPA scores of student athletes as compared to non student-athletes. It is
recommended that college authorities and parents should encourage students to actively
take part in sporting activities and also train students to plan and manage their time for
sports and academic activities.
Description:
Thesis Submitted to the Department of Health, Physical Education, Recreation and
Sports of the Faculty of Science Education, University of Education, Winneba, in
Partial Fulfilment of the Requirements for the Award of the Master of Philosophy
Degree in Physical Education.
JULY, 2015