Technology in action: Ascertaining the impact of cell phone calls on middle school students placed at risk of drop out

Abstract

Background/Objectives: Regular attendance at school is essential for allround development of students. The fundamental objective of this study was to utilize low-cost technology of cell phones to report to parents/guardians about the attendance of their children at schools and ascertain the impacts of cell phone calls on the attendance of Middle School students placed at risk of Drop out. Methods/Statistical analysis: This study was Experimental with a PretestPosttest Control Group by design and descriptive by purpose. The participants were 30 eight graders belonging to a Public Middle School of District Shaheed Benazirabad in Pakistan. These participants were then randomly assigned to Control and Experimental Groups (15 each). For intervention of making cell phone calls to parents/guardians to inform and ask them about the reason for the absence of their child, a teacher in each participating school was assigned this responsibility. The intervention lasted for 3 months. The data was analyzed using SPSS repeated measure t-test to calculate the significance of the impact of intervention. Findings: Results of the present study indicated that the attendance of Experimental Group on Posttest (75.07 %) was significantly higher than that on Pretest (62.87%). Novelty : This study utilizes existing technology available to almost everyone and bridges the parents and school administration to get the best outcome quickly; mobile-based intervention is simple and docile to regulate students’ performance at school level; it also improves the safety of the students.