Differential Impact on the Students’ Performance in the Grade Five Scholarship Examination in Sri Lanka: Based on the Nuwara-Eliya District

Abstract

The grade five scholarship examination emerged as one of the three critical examinations in Sri Lanka. It is evident that the Central Province and the Nuwara-Eliya district recorded the lowest performance in the grade five scholarship examination. Those performed who well in the examination take opportunities to attend popular schools and are entitled for bursaries to continue secondary education. Recently, this examination has been malformed by an enormous competition that creates unbearable pressure on students at their early ages, and the performances are not up to a better level in some areas. Without a better understanding of the differential impact on children’s performance in the grade five scholarship examination, it is scarcely expected to be a good performance. This study attempts to investigate the differential impact on the children’s performance in the grade five scholarship examination in Sri Lanka based on the Nuwara-Eliya district. The primary data gathered through a sample survey were employed in this study. A sample of 378 children was selected using multistage stratified sampling. The multiple linear regression technique was applied to achieve the objective. The coefficient of determination and F test of ANOVA were utilised to evaluate the goodness of fit of the fitted model. The fitted model predicts that monthly family income (β=0.002 with p value=0.000), children’s nutritional status (β=-3.54 with p value=0.002) and enrolment with private tuition (β=6.33 with p value=0.000) have a significant differential impact on the children’s performance in the grade five scholarship examination. Children from higher-income families, those not suffering from low nutritional status, and those attending private tuition are more likely to perform well in the examination than their counterparts. The coefficient of determination (R2) is 0.888, which justifies the estimated model adequately fits in the data emphasizing the selected explanatory variables for describing the performance are significant. This study provides guidance to policy implications to increase performance in the grade five scholarship examination by addressing these significant factors.