Failing to make the varsity switch? You mainly have yourselves to blame‚ academics tell students

With a new academic year finally under way countrywide‚ education experts claim to have cracked the code for moving seamlessly from school to university.

The key is self-motivation and students’ level of interest in what they are studying‚ say Thoko Mahlangu and William Fraser from the University of Pretoria.

The researchers‚ from the department of science‚ mathematics and technology education‚ questioned 14 top matric achievers from Mpumalanga about their experiences of starting university.

“The results indicate that academic excellence in the first year is influenced by self-discipline‚ self-motivation‚ interest in the course‚ self-confidence‚ academic preparedness‚ effort and the belief students have about themselves‚” Mahlangu and Fraser write in the South African Journal of Higher Education.

But they add that their findings emphasise the “significant influence of positive compelling forces” at universities.

“First-year students encountered serious challenges ... related to the heavy academic workload‚ adaptation and the unstructured curricula‚” they said.

“The transition ... provides a form of culture shock requiring significant social and psychological relearning in the face of encounters with new ideas‚ new teachers and friends with different values and beliefs; new freedoms and opportunities; and new academic‚ personal and social demands.”

Mahlangu and Fraser said a key observation was that top matric achievers’ academic performance improved in the second term or semester after they had adapted to university.

“By having an effective ‘self-regulatory system’‚ (they) were able to strike a balance in their activities within the university so as to satisfy the academic needs‚” they said.

“They mainly attributed any unsatisfactory academic achievement on their part to personal‚ unstable and controllable causes such as lack of effort‚ laziness and lack of time management‚ which they could personally rectify and improve.

“Unless students start to realise individually that the power to succeed academically lies within themselves‚ they will not improve or perform as expected at university‚ especially in the first year.”