UNIVERSITY OF ECONOMICS ERASMUS UNVERSITY ROTTERDAM HO CHI MINH CITY INSTITUTE OF SOCIAL STUDIES VIETNAM THE NETHERLANDS VIETNAM – THE NETHERLANDS PROGRAMME FOR M.A IN DEVELOPMENT ECONOMICS DETERMINANTS OF STUDENT’S ACADEMIC PERFORMANCE: THE CASE OF MEKONG RIVER DELTA BY TRAN CHI NGUYEN MASTER OF ARTS IN DEVELOPMENT ECONOMICS HO CHI MINH CITY, NOVEMBER 2016 i LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com UNIVERSITY OF ECONOMICS INSTITUTE OF SOCIAL STUDIES HO CHI MINH CITY THE HAGUE VIETNAM THE NETHERLANDS VIETNAM - NETHERLANDS PROGRAMME FOR M.A IN DEVELOPMENT ECONOMICS DETERMINANTS OF STUDENT’S ACADEMIC PERFORMANCE: THE CASE OF MEKONG RIVER DELTA A thesis submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of MASTER OF ARTS IN DEVELOPMENT ECONOMICS By TRAN CHI NGUYEN Academic Supervisor: DR. PHAM KHANH NAM HO CHI MINH CITY, NOVEMBER 2016 ii LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com DECLARATION This is to guarantee that the complete contents of this thesis (Determinants of student’s academic performance: The case of Mekong River Delta) which are drafted by me and the thesis includes my knowledge and my literature reviews. This thesis has not already been submitted for any degree and it only submitted for only for degree of Master of Art in Development Economic to Vietnam - The Netherlands Program. I take full responsibility for the whole contents that I wrote.
TRAN CHI NGUYEN iii LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com ACKNOWLEDGEMENT I would to thank the dedicated assistance and supports of my supervisor, Dr. PHẠM KHÁNH NAM, during thesis time. The valuable comments and advices play a key role in order to help to finish my thesis. Besides, I sincerely thank all lecturers - officers in Vietnam – Netherlands Program, especially Prof.
NGUYỄN TRỌNG HOÀI and Dr. TRƯƠNG ĐĂNG THỤY, for their dedicated instruction, for all the knowledge from lectures and the supporting for my thesis during the course. I also would like to thank my classmates, especially Mr. ĐẠT ANH, and my friend Ms.
THIÊN KIM, who has helped and supported me to complete my work. Finally, I wish lecturer team all the best and hope they will achieve many success in future path. iv LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com ABBREVIATION GSO: General statistics offices UNESCO: The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization OLS: Ordinary Least Square VIF: Variance Inflation Factor EPF: Education Production Function VHLSS: Vietnamese Household Living Standard Survey GPA: Grade Point Average IV: Instrumental-Variable BLUE: Best Linear Unbiased Estimator IQ : intelligence quotient EQ : emotional quotient v LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com ABSTRACT This paper focus on examines factors that influence student academic performance in Mekong River Delta, Vietnam. Basing on a survey that is conducted by the author in 2015, 297 students of Can Tho University have filtered to examine.
The Education production function of Bowles is applied and identified by a model includes eight variables, which are related academic performance of student. The OLS estimation results show that 5 out of 8 variables are chosen have significant influence on learning outcomes of student and the rest variables have no significant effect on student academic performance in this study. Hence, from the estimation results of this thesis, the suitable policies will be suggested in order to improve learning outcomes of student who experienced under performance group. vi LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com TABLE CONTENTS CHAPTER I: INTRODUCTION .6 Structure of the thesis.
4 CHAPTER II: LITERATURE REVIEWS .1 Review of key concepts .2Review of theory .3Review of Empirical studies .1 Effect of family backgrounds on student academic performance.2 Effect of demographic factors on student academic performance.3 Effect of geographic factors on student academic performance.4 Effect of self-motivation of student on their academic performance.15 CHAPTER III: DATA ANALYSIS AND RESEARCH METHODOLOGY .16 vii LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.2 Measurement of variables .1 The dependent variable .2 The independent variables .24 CHAPTER IV: EMPIRICAL ANALYSIS AND DISCUSSION .1 Overview of education system in Vietnam and Mekong river delta.1 Testing for goodness of fit .2 Testing for Heteroscedasticity .3 Testing for multicollinearity .4 Testing for normality.41 CHAPTER V: CONCLUSION AND POLICY IMPLICATIONS. 43 viii LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.3 Research limitations and suggestion for further studies. 54 ix LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com APPENDIX Appendix 1: Matrix of correlation between variables .54 Appendix 2: Wald’s test of overall significant of the model .54 Appendix 3: Heteroscedasticity test .55 Appendix 4: Multicollinearity test .55 Appendix 5: Skewness/Kurtosis test of residuals and National exam score .55 Appendix 6: PCA result .56 Appendix 7: OLS estimation result .58 x LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com AP LIST OF TABLES Table 3.1: List of variable and expected sign in relevance with student academic performance .1: The observation proportion by provinces .2: Statistical description of factors on student academic performance .3: Correlation of dependent variable and independent variables .4: Regression result of OLS estimation .5: Result of Wald’s test .6: Result of Breusch-Pagan / Cook-Weisberg test .7: Result of Multicollinearity test.8: Result of Skewness/Kurtosis test for exam score.9: Result of Skewness/Kurtosis test for residual .41 xi LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com LIST OF FIGURES Figure 2.1: Conceptual framework of the study.1: Distribution of student’s score .2: Relationship of gender and learning outcomes of student .3: Relationship between health and learning outcomes of student .4: Relationship between geography and learning outcomes of student .32 xii LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com CHAPTER I: INTRODUCTION In this chapter, the current situation of Vietnam education system is introduced in brief and based on information that the importance and the essential of this study will be mentioned. Besides, there are some other crucial parts will be presented such as problem statement, research objectives, research questions, research hypothesis, research scope and organization of the research.1 Problem statements Nowadays, at macro level, education help a country to strengthen the human resource of the economy and occupies a very important role in the development of a country.
Besides, at micro level, education has long been perceived as a main factor help people to get the job, to get wealthy and promote earning of individual and family. In the nineteenth century, it is generally believed that there is nothing can do about what education cannot do. Recently, many researchers declared education plays an important role in the economy of every nation around the world. Especially, developing countries such as Vietnam schools regarded as main element in the infrastructure.
The problem here is the determinant of student performance. In general, people think that student outcomes are affected by intelligent, environment, effort, etc. In development economics, beside the sustainable development goals, education and health are two importance problems due to the influence of them in the long term. The average education level of the society represents the level of development and achievements as well as the future prospects.
A community with high educational level will be more favorable to improve living standard and based on that the national economy is also benefited. Besides, enhancing intellectual level of the people, well- trained labor plus advanced technology will help any countries to improve their productivity in both short term and long term. 1 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.com From the very beginning step, education is an essential part of human life; hence, the exact measurement of children's learning ability is very important. The evaluation demonstrates ability, cognitive level and reaction of children.
Base on that, schools and parents can make the right decision for each child in order to maximum the limited human resource. Another aspect, children learning ability also illustrates the advanced and efficient level of education system relied on those policy makers can apply reasonable policies. Vietnam and the people of Vietnam was recognized the essential role of education to the country. Hence, the government has made a very strong push for the improvement of this field.
According to Le (2003), from 1991 to 2003, he mentioned that more than 120 tertiary institutions was built and this education field encountered highest growth rate in the last 10 year. In the same period, Pham (2002) discovered that the number of student who studied postsecondary raised approximately six times. In addition, the amount of student who studying upper secondary in Mekong river delta is about 377. There are some researchers focus on the determinant of education achievement in Vietnam.
In particular, Le (2000) has determined the factors of Vietnam's secondary education and he found that there is a difference in the enrollment rate between males and female students at upper secondary level. Moreover, Le (2003) using the data of batch 26 students of HCMC University of Economics, he examined the factors between urban and rural students who studying in HCM University of Economics, the result shows that there is a gap between provincial and city students. Mekong River Delta has long been perceived as a remote region, the geographic location of Mekong Delta has many rivers and canals and the infrastructure, road system is underdeveloped which creates an obstacle for student to access to school. Moreover, the youth literacy rate of Mekong River Delta is the third lowest in comparison with other regions in Vietnam and this rate is 0.80 percentage points lower than National youth literacy rate.
The adult literacy rate in Mekong Delta is 2 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.10 percent and it is about 6 percentage points lower than the National rate. Therefore, more attentions should be paid for the low education level region such as Mekong River Delta. In fact, there are a few researches examine about the case of Mekong River Delta. This thesis is the first research which examines the influence of the determinants on the individual student’s academic performance with the dependent variable is the individual score of students from National High School Graduation Examination in 2015 for the Mekong River Delta.
In brief, the intellectual level of people in Mekong River Delta is quite low in comparison with the whole country. A large part of population still living in the countryside, and the accessibility to education is very limited. Therefore, the researches is about solving the education problems in Mekong River Delta is very necessary. Hence, a method in order to identify determinants of student academic performance and the magnitude of the influence of those factors will be necessary.
This study will propose determinant factors which influence the student academic performance and base on that, the policy recommendations will be suggested to policy makers in order to have suitable policies. Especially for developing country like Vietnam where the middle-income trap is becoming national problem 1.2 Research Objectives There are two key research objectives of this paper: (1) To examine the determinants of student’s performance. (2) To give policy implications to enhance student academic performance.3 Research Questions In order to match the objectives in the section above, this study must concentrate on these questions: (1) What are the determinants of student’s academic performance? (2) Do these determinants affect academic performance of student? 3 LUAN VAN CHAT LUONG download : add luanvanchat@agmail.4 Research scope The scope of this research is Mekong River Delta of Vietnam, including 12 provinces. An Giang, Bac Lieu, Ben Tre, Ca Mau, Can Tho, Dong Thap, Hau Giang, Kien Giang, Soc Trang, Tien Giang, Tra Vinh, Vinh Long.
All statistic and data in this study are collected from a survey of the author at Can Tho University in 2015.5 Structure of the thesis This study contains five chapters: Chapter 1 is the introduction part of this study, which mentions about background and foundation of this study. Chapter 2 provides fundamental definition about learning outcomes, theoretical reviews and some empirical studies relevant to determinants of student academic performance. Moreover, there is also a recap table of literature reviews and analytical framework the end of chapter two.