A COMMUNITY BASED ASSESEMENT OF SCHOOL PARTCIPATION AND ASSOCIATED FACTORS IN GEDO ZONE,SOUTHERN ETHIOPIA

Abstract

 A community-based survey was made to assess the school participation and dropout rates,householdes attitude towards education,households ability and willinness to educate their children.data was collected using a household survey questionnaire on a total 0f [1034 (rural = 747 and urban = 287) households in six PAs and two UDAs randomly
selected from Yergache[e and Bule Woredas, Gedeo Zone. Southern
Ethiopia. Descriptive statistics. chi-square analysis and t-statistics were
computed to find possible differences wirh respect to gender, literacy status,
and attitude of households towards education. locations and residential
variations. The results revealed that literacy status, gender of the
household head, location and residential variations are significantly (p <.
O1) associated with household's ability to pay for schooling. Residential
variation and family size are found to markedly affect household 's
willingness to educate their children. However, statistically significant
differences are observed in age at entry into grade one due to differences of
location, place of residence and gender of the household head. Implications
of the findings to address the existing problems are also discussed in this paper