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Assessing predictors of students’ academic performance in Ethiopian new medical schools: a concurrent mixed-method study: a concurrent mixed-method study

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Title: Assessing predictors of students’ academic performance in Ethiopian new medical schools: a concurrent mixed-method study: a concurrent mixed-method study
Authors: Gebru, Hafte Teklay, Verstegen, Daniëlle
Source: BMC Med Educ
BMC Medical Education, Vol 23, Iss 1, Pp 1-9 (2023)
Publisher Information: Springer Science and Business Media LLC, 2023.
Publication Year: 2023
Subject Terms: Medical education, Schools, Students, Medical, LC8-6691, 4. Education, Educational Measurement/methods, Special aspects of education, 3. Good health, Cohort Studies, Medical, Academic Performance, Medicine, Humans, NMEI, Educational Measurement, Students, Schools, Medical, Research Article
Description: Background Since 2012 the Ethiopian Federal Ministry of Health and Education implemented a new medical curriculum in 13 institutions. The new curriculum introduced some questions on its admission policy: students can join with different educational backgrounds. Students’ performance on qualifying exams and grade point average are lower than desired. Therefore, the aim of the study was to investigate what factors predict the academic performance of students in the New Medical Education Initiative in Ethiopia. Methods A concurrent mixed method of survey and qualitative was used; for the survey, a structured self-administered questionnaire was distributed to students of four randomly selected medical schools from December 2018 to January 2019. The questionnaire includes questions about socio-demographic and educational background of participants. Multiple linear regression analysis was used in order to identify the factors associated with academic performance. In-depth interviews were conducted with 15 key informants to explore qualitatively. Results In the multiple linear regressions, stress was associated with lower academic performance. Students with prior education in the field of health science outperformed students with other bachelors. The cumulative grade point average of the previous bachelor degree and the score on the entrance exam to join medicine also significantly predicted performance. Although some more variables are identified from the qualitative interviews, its findings supported the survey results. Conclusions Of the number of predictor variables analyzed in the model, only stress, prior educational degree, performance in the prior degree and entrance exam score were significantly correlated with the performance of students in their preclinical medical engagement.
Document Type: Article
Other literature type
Language: English
ISSN: 1472-6920
DOI: 10.1186/s12909-023-04372-4
Access URL: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/37330493
https://doaj.org/article/3fcc91464d8d42488f4be9845d797725
https://cris.maastrichtuniversity.nl/en/publications/0b9abb73-57a7-428c-af08-864733aeaba4
https://doi.org/10.1186/s12909-023-04372-4
Rights: CC BY
URL: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) . The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/ (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) ) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated in a credit line to the data.
Accession Number: edsair.doi.dedup.....e2840654649b72f6a951d9ae8d254983
Database: OpenAIRE
Description
Abstract:Background Since 2012 the Ethiopian Federal Ministry of Health and Education implemented a new medical curriculum in 13 institutions. The new curriculum introduced some questions on its admission policy: students can join with different educational backgrounds. Students’ performance on qualifying exams and grade point average are lower than desired. Therefore, the aim of the study was to investigate what factors predict the academic performance of students in the New Medical Education Initiative in Ethiopia. Methods A concurrent mixed method of survey and qualitative was used; for the survey, a structured self-administered questionnaire was distributed to students of four randomly selected medical schools from December 2018 to January 2019. The questionnaire includes questions about socio-demographic and educational background of participants. Multiple linear regression analysis was used in order to identify the factors associated with academic performance. In-depth interviews were conducted with 15 key informants to explore qualitatively. Results In the multiple linear regressions, stress was associated with lower academic performance. Students with prior education in the field of health science outperformed students with other bachelors. The cumulative grade point average of the previous bachelor degree and the score on the entrance exam to join medicine also significantly predicted performance. Although some more variables are identified from the qualitative interviews, its findings supported the survey results. Conclusions Of the number of predictor variables analyzed in the model, only stress, prior educational degree, performance in the prior degree and entrance exam score were significantly correlated with the performance of students in their preclinical medical engagement.
ISSN:14726920
DOI:10.1186/s12909-023-04372-4