Abstract:
School environment plays an important role in development of self. It may have a positive or negative impact on students’ level of self-esteem and hence academic achievement and behavior. The purpose of this study was to investigate whether available learning facilities in a school can influence students’ level of self-esteem. Ex post facto research design was applied where learning facilities available in a school and students’ self-esteem were measured retrogressively. The population of the study comprised of students in public secondary schools in Nyandarua West Sub County which had 8 public secondary schools, with a student population of 3067. In view of the relatively small number of schools in the Sub County, the study adopted a census enquiry where all the schools were included in the study. However, schools were stratified as boarding, day/boarding or day. Further, a population of 1320 form two class students were purposefully selected which gave rise to a students’ simple random sample of 240. Reliability was estimated through test-retest technique achieving a PPM correlation coefficient of r = .78. The instruments achieved an internal reliability of 0.88 as measured using Cronbach’s alpha coefficients. Data was collected using questionnaires and quantitively analysed using mean calculations, percentages and one-way ANOVA tests. It was found out that learning facilities available in a school has a significant influence on students’ self-esteem, either raising or lowering it. Students in schools with more and better quality learning facilities had a higher level of self-esteem as compared to their counterparts in schools with lesser and low quality facilities. It is therefore recommended that learning facilities should be improved in all school categories. As well, educators should be sensitized on the role of school environment on students’ self-esteem.
