The Level of Student Engagement in Deep Approaches to Learning in Public Universities in Ethiopia

Abstract

Students benefit from learning if they put forth efforts to engage in deep approaches to learning (DAL). This study was conducted to assess the level of student engagement in deep approaches to learning in public universities. The study involved 717 second and third year (senior) students selected from Woldia, Addis Ababa and Debre Berhan Universities using a combination of stratified and cluster sampling methods from the public universities in Ethiopia. Data were obtained using an eleven-item four-point, Likert-type scale adapted from the American Survey of Student Engagement. Analysis using a two-tailed one-sample t-test showed that student engagement in deep approaches to learning was statistically significantly lower than the expected mean. The result also revealed that course work gave little or some emphasize to higher-order learning and most of the students were sometimes engaged in reflective and integrative learning.