Retraining Needs of Lecturers in Disease Prevention and Control Practices in Small Ruminants in Colleges of Education in North Central Nigeria

Abstract

The study determined the retraining needs of lecturers in disease prevention and control practices in small ruminants in colleges of education in North-central Nigeria. Four research questions were answered, four hypotheses were tested at the 0.05 level of significance, and four objectives guided the study. The population for the study was 182 lecturers. All the population was used because the size was small and manageable; hence, there was no sampling. A 102-item structured questionnaire (LRNDPCPQ) was used for data collection. The instrument and content were validated by five experts. The Cronbach alpha (α) method was used to determine the internal consistency of the instrument items, which yielded a reliability coefficient of 0.91 and 0.89, for need and performance respectively. Data collected was analysed using standard deviation to answer research questions (NPI) and the Need Performance Index for performance. The findings revealed that agricultural education lecturers needed retraining in disease prevention practices, in disease control measures, in identifying materials for disease prevention, and in treatment practices; therefore, it was recommended that agricultural education lecturers be trained and retrained through seminars, workshops, and short-term retraining courses to make up for their deficiencies in disease prevention and control practices in the colleges of education.