Impact of Climate Change on Students’ Academic Performance

Abstract

The study basically investigated the impact of climate change on students’ academic performance. The essential objectives of the study were to determine significant relationship between climate change variation and students’ academic performance, their distraction from learning due to climate change disruption in adverse weather condition and exploring teachers’ perception regarding climate change impact on students’ attention, attendance and performance. A quantitative research method was used in this study; data were collected in district lower chitral from private secondary schools through simple random sampling technique from both teachers and students to ensure equal representations. A close ended questionnaire was asked from the respondents to know their perceptions about the impact of climate change on students’ academic performance and the collected data were analyzed through SPSS. The findings proved that there is a significant impact of climate change variations on students’ education and decreasing their motivations, attention and attendance in schools. Teachers also acknowledged that unfavorable weather conditions, accidental schools closure, rise in temperature and unfavorable classroom condition are hindering students’ academic performance in a significant way. It is recommended that education authorities to make education more resilient to climatic events by designing effective strategies. The local education departments were recommended to plan for safer school infrastructure, and flexible academic calendars. This study was essential to ensure that each student’s in Chitral region could continue their education without major interruptions caused as a result of climate change.