Microbiology Students Performance at School of Biosciences and Biotechnology

Microbiology is a study of microorganisms not visible to the eyes. To obtain a degree in Bachelor of Science with distinction in Microbiology, a student must complete 120 credit hours with 36 credit hours are core subjects related to microbiology. The mode of teaching microbiology subjects include lecture, hands on practical, tutorial and field trip. In this paper, we analysed the achievement of microbiology students in the first and second semester of 2009/2010 session. We found that students who scored grades A/A- were less than 20% of student population for all the subjects related to microbiology. This paper firstly discusses the curriculum for the microbiology programme to better understand the basic structure of this programme. Secondly, to understand and improve the teaching processes in microbiology subjects by performing a survey was performed among microbiology students. Students suggest improvement in lecture presentation whereby animation could be used; a more systematic handling of practical session, full use of the university's Interactive Teaching and Learning System or SPIN especially to upload lecture notes, the laboratory session notional hours should be followed accordingly and more tutorials be given to aid learning.