Motivational Mechanisms for Encouraging Youths to Study Agricultural Education in the Tertiary Institutions in Abia State

Abstract

The study assessed motivational mechanisms for encouraging youths to study agricultural education in tertiary institutions in Abia State. The study was guided by three specific purposes, three research questions and three hypotheses.  The study adopted survey research design. The population of the study comprised of 15 Agricultural Education Lecturers and 103 Agricultural Education Students from Michael Okpara university of Agriculture Umudike and National Teachers Training Institute. Simple random sampling was used to select 5 Agricultural Education lecturers and 25 Agricultural Education Students each from the institutions making a total population of 10 Agricultural Education lecturers and 50 Agricultural Education students. The instrument used for data collection was 22-item “Motivational Mechanisms for Encouraging Youths to Study Agricultural Education in The Tertiary Institutions” (MMEYSAE). The instrument was subjected to face validation by the three Experts. The reliability of the instruments was determined using Cronbach alpha statistic which yielded an overall reliability index of 0.83. Data collected were analyzed using mean and standard deviation to answer research questions while t-test was used to test the hypotheses at 0.05 level of significance. The findings of the study among other things showed that the various factors that discourage students from agricultural education programs include lack of funds to establish agricultural enterprises and irrelevant outdated curriculum. Also, various intrinsic motivation factors like personal interest and self-concept can help to encourage youths to study agricultural education in the tertiary institutions. Finally, extrinsic factors such as, provision of loans without collateral and provision of agricultural machines for commencement of commercial agriculture after graduation.  Based on the findings of the study, it is recommended that Government in collaboration with non-governmental organizations should find ways to provide extrinsic   and extrinsic motivational mechanism for youths to study agricultural education.