Abstract:

The COVID-19 pandemic has had widespread impacts on various aspects of human life. Since its outbreak, a wide range of restrictions and regulations have been implemented to reduce the spread of the virus. This study aims to investigate grade-based differences in academic performance among Health Sciences students during the years 2019, 2020, and 2021, specifically in relation to the pandemic. Academic performance was measured for students who received 'pass grades' between 2019 and 2021. The study sample consisted of 845 full-time students, with 418 from the Health Science Faculty and the remaining from the Vocational School of Health Services. Of the 845 participants, 342 were online students, while the remaining 503 were traditional face-to-face students. The results indicate that online education has led to an improvement in grade-based academic performance compared to the conventional face-to-face system (95% Confidence Interval of the Difference: Lower -13.34, Upper -10.32 t-test: -15.40 p=0.012). Therefore, we recommend that universities incorporate online education into their academic curriculum.

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