Austin Wahl

3079 Hidden Forest Court

Marietta, Ga 30066

(470)-388-3622

How Involvement in Extracurriculars Affects

Academic Productivity

Introduction

Almost every college and university offers sport, clubs, and other
extracurricular activities to enrolled students. In certain cases, students can
obtain scholarships for the sport(s) they play for that school. Especially at a
public university such as KSU, campus involvement is a major aspect of
academic and social life. Students who live near or on campus and do not
belong to any club or group are less likely to experience the positive outcomes
and benefits of the “college experience” as well as maintain a proper work
ethic to achieve substantial grades.

Research Topic / purpose

Students who are active in organizations or clubs are more likely to have
better grades and a higher daily productivity. Students with too much free time
risk falling into unproductive habits. The purpose of this research project is to
find trends in academic success related to the types of clubs and organizations
that students are actively pursuing.

Goals of research

1. Develop a sensible hypothesis that directly correlates to the success of

students based on their extracurriculars
2. Conduct a survey that measures different types of success depending on
the field of study in which the club/group is focused on.
 3. Change or add survey questions throughout the process of data
collection if needed. This may only be necessary if a question is
constantly being questioned or not answered clearly.
4. Work with group to analyze this data and make conclusions accurately
explaining the data collected
5. Use these conclusions to develop methods of action to further our
findings. Whether this may be simply sharing data results or coming up
with ways to get more students involved with on or off campus activities
and clubs.

Qualifications

I am currently a part of the Theta Chi Fraternity on Kennesaw campus.

As this is my only club I am actively participating at the moment besides work
and other responsibilities, it has taught me how to better manage my time with
a full schedule. Knowing that I have a full-time student schedule and also a
full-time commitment to a Greek chapter, I have an understanding of how
constantly having responsibilities allows one to always be thinking about said
responsibilities. My hypothesis is being in an organization such as the one I am
in leads to a naturally increased work ethic and drive.

Schedule

(Time of completion depends on the number of members in the group)

● WEEK 1 - conducting the survey with questions like: “Are you a part of a
club? And if so, what club(s) are you a part of?” Then, questions about
GPA and ability to timely submit work will be asked as well.
● WEEK 2 - after approval, then my team will travel around all parts of
campus handing out and taking these surveys. Questions on majors will
also be asked. This will take the longest so it could run for an extra week.
The plan is to take sections of the campus each day at similar times to
avoid surveying the same people elsewhere on campus. This will increase
the spread of students we collect data from.
● WEEK 3 - This would most likely be the final week, including analyzing
the data and conducting a recommendation report on the data collected.
 Team Roles

● Team Leader: The team leader leads the team in all aspects of the project
by planning, organizing, and communicating all steps of the surveying
and research process.
● Survey Leader: The survey leader is in control of conducting and creating
the surveys, other members of the group will also be handing out the
surveys to be more efficient with collecting data.
● Data analyzer and researcher: This member will be in charge of
analyzing and interpreting the data to form conclusions and theories
based on the data we find.
● Writer/hypothesizer: The writer will write the recommendation report
of course with the help of other members but has the main purpose of
finalizing the thoughts and data of the research.

Conclusion

To summarize, campuses around the nation build their reputation on

being available to students and encourage involvement. I have experienced
college with and without the involvement of clubs and plan to use my personal
experience to be more comprehensive of the research we plan to conduct. The
purpose of this research project is to support this idea and prove that students
should be actively participating in certain clubs. To expand on this, we are
looking to investigate which clubs, related to students’ majors, provide for the
best productivity and academic learning experience.