Science and Skill Acquisition in Junior Secondary School in Ekiti State, Nigeria

Abstract

This study examined science and skill acquisition in junior Secondary Schools in Ekiti State, Nigeria. The study adopted the descriptive research of the survey type. Participants were 240 science-oriented youths randomly selected from six states across six geopolitical zones in Nigeria.  Three instruments titled “Problem of Unemployment in your Locality Questionnaire” (PUYLQ), “Skill Acquisition Programme Questionnaire” (SAPEQ) and “Security Challenges Questionnaire” (SCQ) were used to collect data for the study. The reliability of PUYLQ, SAPEQ and SCQ were determined through test and re-test method and these yielded a correlation co-efficient of 0.87, 0.85 and 0.89, respectively at 0.05 level of significance. Two-way Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) was used to analyze the data. The finding revealed that employment can significantly influence level of skill acquisition programme among science based students in Nigeria. The finding also revealed that gender has no significant influence on level of skill acquisition programmes among science-based students. The study revealed that employment status and level of skill acquisition can significantly influence security challenges in Nigeria. It was recommended that government should provide employment for the science based graduates for national development. Government should also engage the jobless science based graduates with skill acquisition programmes to reduce social vices in the country. It was also recommended that, there should be no gender disparity while creating employment for science based students. In addition, both male and female Science graduates should give opportunity for participating in skill acquisition programmes for national development.

Keywords: National development, Skill acquisition programmes, Science Graduates, Employment/job opportunities, Insecurity.

DOI: 10.7176/JEP/12-8-06

Publication date:March 31^st 2021