Micheline J. Naude

The Relationship between Increasing Enrolment and Student Academic Achievement in Higher Education

ABSTRACT This article reports on a study of which the main aim was to provide insight into whether increasing the enrolment of large classes influences student academic achievement at the University of KwaZulu-Natal (UKZN), City, South Africa. The massification of higher education has led to greater numbers of students being enrolled in contact programmes. there is a widely accepted inverse relationship between class size and academic achievement for small class sizes and it would be speculative to extend the same understanding to larger class sizes. It is within this context that a cross-sectional study was conducted during which student achievement was analysed against increasing the enrolment of already large classes, in selected undergraduate modules at UKZN over a period of four years. convenience sampling and judgemental sampling were used to select modules in the discipline of Supply Chain Management (SCM). The findings revealed that while the average class size increased significantly, the pass rates remained constant. Based on the study findings, it was concluded that an increase in the enrolment of already large classes does not influence student academic achievement. It is recommended that the study be replicated in other schools and faculties where disciplines have experienced similar increases in the enrolment of large classes, thereby presenting an opportunity to either validate or dispute the study results. It is further recommended that the role of peer effects be subjected to further study to establish whether they have any influence on academic achievement. These results are expected to encourage future debate on how faculties manage increasing student enrolments at higher education institutions.