Educators’ Rating of Strategies Considered Necessary for Motivation of Potential Entrepreneurs among Secondary School Students for Poverty Alleviation in Anambra State

Abstract

Timely planning and strategizing for the future had remained the major strength of wealthy nations; who in a bid to unleash their full development potentials, have set up educational programmes, necessary to fight poverty in all its ramifications. This study aimed at assessing strategies considered necessary for the motivation of potential entrepreneurs among secondary school students for poverty alleviation in Anambra State of Nigeria. The study was a descriptive survey conducted with 110 business educators purposively sampled from five local government areas in Anambra State. Two research questions guided the conduct of the study and one null hypothesis tested at 0.05 level of significance. A validated structured questionnaire with reliability coefficient of 0.94 was used for data collection. The data collected were analyzed using mean scores and z-test statistic. The findings of the study revealed among others that cash and scholarship awards, exposing students to entrepreneurship education such as interacting with small scale business owners, display of project materials and government sponsorship, were considered as highly necessary strategies. However, special gift from teachers and school authority, recognizing students through assigning of responsibilities were considered as barely necessary strategies by the business educators. It was concluded that the strategies considered fairly necessary and above should be used to motivate potential entrepreneurs in secondary schools. It was recommended among others that educators should constantly be provided with in-service training on entrepreneurship programmes to help them develop entrepreneurial skills required for effective motivation of potential entrepreneurs in their subjects.

Keywords: Poverty Alleviation, Motivation, Potential Entrepreneurs, Educators and Strategies