Comparative analysis of item parameters of State and National Basic Education Certificate Examinations in National Values Education in Benue State, Nigeria

Abstract

This study compared item parameters of Benue State Examinations Board (BSEB) and National Examinations Council (NECO)'s Basic Education Certificate Examinations (BECE) in National Values Education (NVE) 2017. This is due to persistent students' performance variation in the two examining bodies. Item Response Theory (IRT) approach was adopted. Two research questions were developed, and the study adopted a descriptive survey design. The target population was all Junior Secondary School three students in Benue State, 1500 students were selected from eight BSEB and NECO-BECE registered schools using multistage sampling procedure. Data were collected using adopted BSEB and NECO-BECE 2017 NVE multiple-choice items, administered using intact class and analysed with IRT 2PL and t-test. The study found that BSEB has more poor items (11 items) than NECO-BECE 2017 NVE (5 items). There is a significant difference in the item

difficulty parameter of BSEB and NECO-BECE

(t₈₈ = .813, p= 0.003),

there is no significant

difference in item discrimination between the two tests

(t₈₈ = - 1.661, p= .079) . BSEB should

improve the quality of BECE items through training and retraining of staff and test developers for moderate item discrimination and difficulty parameters. IRT should be embraced by the two examining bodies to have valid test items.