Impacts of Time Management, Transportation, Home Environment and Family Responsibilities on Academic Performance and Focus of Day Scholar Students: A Case of the University of Malakand

Abstract

Day scholars can have special challenges that can impact their school experience.On the basis of the challenges found in the first paper of this series, this qualitative study was conducted to investigate the effect of time management problems, transportation problems, home environment and family responsibilities on the academic performance and concentration of day scholar students at the University of Malakand, Pakistan.A total of 20 purposively selected day scholar students of BS Education programme were interviewed using Semi-structured written interview procedure.Braun and Clarke’s (2006, 2022) reflexive thematic analysis has been used to analyse the data.The results showed that the academic performance was influenced by the lack of time management and the poor transportation quality, which led to missed classes, tiredness and quickness in doing homework assignments and insufficient examination preparation.Also, difficult home conditions such as noise, distractions, and strong family demands significantly affected children's abilities to concentrate, motivate, and maintain their attention on academic work.Those pressures, on a consistent basis, were reported as making those participants feel academically disadvantaged when compared to the students at hostel.The findings confirm Bronfenbrenner's bioecological systems theory, and illustrate the myriad challenges students encounter as a result of mismatches between the home, travel, and university environments.The study highlights the need for specific institutional support for day scholar students in higher education institutions with limited resources.This paper, in conjunction with its companion paper, provides a broad overview of the challenges and specific impacts, and has implications for working towards equity and better academic outcomes for commuting students.