Rating of strategies for transforming technical vocational education and training for the 21^st century by tertiary institution lecturers in South East Nigeria

Abstract

Nigeria like most nations of the world has embraced technical vocational education and training (TVET) as a veritable tool for technological transformation and sustainable development but the nation is yet to reap the benefits as unemployment and poverty levels are still high. The paper determined the rating of school-industry partnership and retraining of lecturers as strategies for transforming TVET in Nigeria for the 21^st Century to address the perennial problems by 79 TVET lecturers from tertiary institutions in the south east zone.  Two research questions and two null hypotheses were used for the study. A 5-point validated rating scale questionnaire with reliability coefficients of 0.72 and 0.80 for the two sections was used for data collection.  Mean and standard deviation were used to analyze data in respect of the research questions while the analysis of variance (ANOVA) and z-test were used to test the hypotheses at 0.05 level of  significance. Findings revealed that the two strategies were rated as effective strategies for transforming TVET in the 21^st Century. The researcher concludes that the two strategies are suitable for addressing the problems besetting TVET and transform the programmes to adequately prepare the products for effective performance in the 21^st Century.  Consequently, she recommends among others that management of TVET institutions in Nigeria and other countries of the world should adopt and ensure effective implementation of the two strategies and that TVET lecturers and teachers at all levels of the education system should search for suitable retraining programmes to upgrade and update their technological competencies to remain relevant in the 21^st Century.

Keywords: Rating, strategy, transformation