Work Skill Needs of Welding and Fabrication Students of Technical Colleges in Abia State

Abstract

The study determined the work skill needs of welding and fabrication students of technical colleges in Abia State. Four research questions guided the study, and four null hypotheses were tested at a 0.05 level of significance. A descriptive survey research design was adopted. The population consisted of 220 final-year students of welding and fabrication from all Technical Colleges in Abia State. There was no sampling because the population of respondents was small. The instrument used for data collection was the Work Skill Needs Scale (WSNS). The instrument was subjected to face and content validation by three experts, and a reliability coefficient of 0.76 was obtained. Data were analyzed using mean and standard deviation, while t-test statistics were used to test the hypotheses. The findings revealed that: (i) identified problem-solving skills were needed by welding and fabrication students of technical colleges in Abia State, (ii) all the communication skills were needed by welding and fabrication students of technical colleges in Abia State, (iii) all the self-management skills were needed by welding and fabrication students of technical colleges in Abia State, and (iv) identified critical thinking skills were needed by welding and fabrication students of technical colleges in Abia State. Among the recommendations is that the government should set up a committee to amend the TVET curriculum at the secondary level to include instructional activities that will impact the students.