Makerere University Business School (MUBS) has decried the rising number of failures of statistics students registered since COVID-19 broke out.
According to Prof. Moses Muhwezi, the deputy principal at the college of statistics, they have since recorded the highest rates of failures due to the COVID pandemic.
This, Prof. Muhwezi told New Vision at MUBS that immediately after the pandemic, the performance rate slowed down.
“When we introduced online learning due to COVID-19, students had challenges with connectivity and navigation. Students have a phobia for mathematics, lack confidence in doing statistics, and also have a poor reading culture,” he said.
While addressing students on Business Statistics Day on Monday, August 8,2022, he said statistics needs more attention, but instead, most of the students spend more of their time on social media.
The event was organised by the Business Students Statistics Association under the theme, Harnessing Statistics in the Changing Business Environment.
Kennedy Owamazima, a third-year student, told his fellow statisticians that the programme is very practical but a section of students cut lectures and end up missing out on the concept.
He added that many students have a bias in mathematics, which stands as a vivid reason why they are getting poor results.
Prof. Muhwezi advised the university to find a better means of boosting the performance of students.
“The university should make mathematics more interesting like other subjects. At times, students get bored, and that results in poor performance.”
On that matter, he also revealed that to ensure boosting on the students performance, the university has embarked on providing tutorials and business magazines to students after every class.
He stated that students used to teach their colleagues after classes, but the discussants would not know much; however, they would be able to understand more with tutorials and business magazines.
“The university is planning to introduce magazines for business so that students get more knowledge about businesses,” Prof. Muhwezi explained.
“Students will be able to get a deeper understanding even if the lecturer is not with them,” he added.
