Evaluation of Student’s Industrial Work Experience Scheme (SIWES) on the Attainment of Employable Skills by Agricultural Education Graduates in Abia State

Abstract

The study was carried out to evaluate the extent SIWES programme has led to the attainment of employability skills by Agricultural Education Graduates in Abia State. The study was guided by three research questions and three hypotheses. The study adopted the Descriptive Survey Design. The population of the study was 239 which comprised 211 Heads of Agricultural Science from 211 public secondary schools across three Education Zones (Aba Ohafia and Umuahia) and 28 identified managers of Agro-allied industries/farms in Abia State. The sample of the study was 184 which comprised 156 Heads of Agricultural Science from 156 Secondary Schools and 27 identified managers of Agro-allied industries/ farms. The instrument for data collection was a research questionnaire. The instrument was face validated by three experts and the reliability of the instrument was 0.81 which was derived using the Pearson’s Product Moment Correlation Coefficient Statistic. The data was collected through the distribution of 184 copies of the research instrument to 184 respondents. The research questions were answered using the mean and standard deviations while the null hypotheses were tested using the independent sample t-test at 0.05 level of significance. The findings of the study revealed that the SIWES programme has adequately equipped the students with employability skills in livestock production, while it did not adequately equip the students with the basic skills in crop production and skills of how to couple plough to the tractor, drive and work with tractor in the farm, harvest crops using harvester. Based on the findings, the study recommends that SIWES coordinators should ensure that emphasis should be focused on providing employability skills in crop production and equip the students with the skills to utilize modern farm machinery