THE IMPACT OF COMMUNAL CONFLICTS ON ENROLMENT, ATTENDANCE AND ACHIEVEMENT OF JUNIOR SCHOOL BASIC SCIENCES IN RIVERS STATE, NIGERIA

The study investigated the effects of communal conflict on enrolment, attendance, and achievement of Junior Secondary School Basic Science Student in Rivers State. Stratified random sampling technique was used to select the study sample Random sampling technique was used to select 10 affected and 10 not affected Junior secondary school in Rivers State. This includes 400 junior secondary school students 20 teachers and 20 head teachers. School records, classroom register, school facilities and security questionnaires were used to elicit data on the enrolment, attendance, school facilities, state of security and cognitive achievement of students in basic sciences. The instruments were validated by experts in education. T-test was used to test the raised hypotheses. The findings revealed that there is a significant difference in the availability of Educational facilities in the affected Junior Secondary schools before and after the conflict (t (438, 0.44) = -21.37, p= .00000). There is a significant difference in the state of security in the affected junior secondary before and after communal conflict in Rivers State (t(438, 0.35) = -27.65, p= .000). There is a significant difference in the state of security in the academic achievement of student between schools in the areas affected and those not affected by the communal conflict in Rivers State (t(324, 1.10) = 4.481, p= .000). It was recommended that the communities should avoid clashing one another rand this has a concomitant affect on the availability of educational resources for teaching and learning. The communities should avoid communal conflict as this has an effect on the academic achievement of the pupils. The insecurity in the school system would be increased where there is communal conflict. Therefore, communal conflict should be completely discouraged.