REVITALIZING AGRICULTURAL EDUCATION AND TRAINING IN TERTIARY INSTITUTIONS FOR FOOD SECURITY AND NATIONAL DEVELOPMENT IN GOMBE STATE, NIGERIA

Abstract

The study focused on revitalizing agricultural education and training in tertiary institution for food security and national Development in Gombe State Nigeria. The study was guided by three specific purposes, three research questions and three null hypotheses. Descriptive survey research design was adopted. The population of the study was 478, using Tero Yammani’s formula, a sample of 214 was obtained comprising of 179 government officials and 35 senior lecturers (Federal University Kashere and Federal College of Education Technical) all from Gombe State. A 32-item structured questionnaire developed from literature was the instrument for data collection. The instrument was face validated by three experts from department of agricultural education, University of Nigeria, Nsukka. The internal consistency of the questionnaire items was determined using Cronbach alpha reliability method and an overall coefficient of 0.77 was obtained. The collected data by the researchers and two research assistants were analysed using mean to answer the research questions and t-test for the hypotheses tested at 0.05 level of significance. It was found out that respondents agreed to the various factors affecting agricultural education in higher institutions, there is no statistically significant difference in the mean response of government officials and senior lecturers on the factors affecting agricultural education in higher institutions and then respondents agreed to the roles of Government in revitalizing agricultural education in higher institutions. Based on the findings, the study recommends among others lecturers of Agricultural Education should be placing more emphasis on practical rather than theory in teaching agriculture, Government through ministry of Agriculture should provide machines and equipment to attract students to Agricultural Education in tertiary institutions for food security and national development.