Earthquake Does Not Hurt Academic Performance

University of Canterbury research has revealed that overall academic performance by undergraduate students at UC in Semester 2 of 2010 was as good as that during the same period in 2009.

“The results of our research are encouraging,” said a member of the UC research team, Psychology Professor Simon Kemp. “While we acknowledge that the earthquake and subsequent aftershocks may well have had a serious effect on some individual students, it appears that student performance in general was not negatively affected by the 4 September earthquake. In fact, while in previous years, the grade point average for students seems to have decreased from semester one to semester two, in 2010 it held constant.”

The researchers also found that withdrawals during the period were at normal levels.

The team was prompted to undertake their research into academic performance by a questionnaire carried out in late September and early October last year which showed that members of the general public who had experienced the earthquake and its aftershocks reported that both their sleep and their thinking had been disrupted.

“Many people commented that they found it difficult to remember things or that they felt their brains were working more slowly than usual. The self-reported effects were much more serious for women than men.

“We were interested in researching whether those reports related to real-world problems in thinking or remembering. In particular, we wanted to investigate whether the earthquake affected academic performance for the second semester of 2010 at UC.”

The research looked at results for all undergraduate students who completed at least one paper in both semester one and semester two. Papers that extended over both semesters were excluded.

“I am very pleased to see the results of this research,” said University of Canterbury Vice-Chancellor, Dr Rod Carr. “Our students and staff worked hard to ensure that academic performance did not suffer as a result of the 4 September earthquake. We are now firmly back on track to provide a world-class learning environment here at UC and are looking forward to a very positive year in 2011.”

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