Assessment of the Implementation of Universal Basic Education (UBE) Programme in Ogoja Education Zone of Cross River State, Nigeria

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to assess the implementation of UBE programme in Ogoja Education zone of Cross River State. Four research questions and two null hypotheses guided the study. Evaluation Survey design was adopted in this study. The study was carried out in Ogoja Education zone of Cross River State, Nigeria. The population of the study comprised all the teachers in 36 public secondary schools spread across the five local government areas of the zone. There were 1150 male teachers and 650 female teachers making a total of 1800 respondents. The sample size for the study was 360 respondents. The instrument for data collection was a questionnaire and checklist titled Universal Basic Education Instrument (UBEI). The questionnaire was structured on a 4-point rating scale of Strongly Agree (SA); Agree (A); Disagree (D); Strongly Disagree (SD) with numerical values of 4, 3, 2 and 1, respectively.To ensure the face validity of the instrument, the initial draft of the instrument (UBEI) was submitted to three experts, from Measurement and Evaluation for validation, all from the Faculty of Education, University of Nigeria, Nsukka. The experts were requested to examine the items of the instrument in terms of its content relevance and item clarity. Also, the experts were equally requested to make corrections in order to ensure that the language is understandable and clear to the respondents. Based on the observations of these experts, the research instrument was modified appropriately. The reliability of the instrument was ascertained through trial- testing of the instrument developed by the researcher. Thirty (30) teachers were used. The reason for trial-testing was to determine the internal consistency of the items. Cronbach Alpha was used to ascertain the reliability coefficient. Cronbach’s Alpha was used to test the reliability because the items of the instrument are polytomously scored. The reliability coefficients for clusters 1 and 2 were 0.75 and 0.73 respectively. The overall reliability coefficient was 0.74. This shows that the instrument was reliable and used for the study. Direct delivery and retrieval technique was used by the researcher and six research assistants to collect the required data for the study. Mean and standard deviation were used to answer the four research questions while the null hypotheses were tested using t – test statistic. All the hypotheses were tested at 0.05 level of significance. The result of this study showed that teachers differ in their perception on the supervision of instruction for the implementation UBE programme. It is recommended therefore that the teachers should be given adequate support from the government through in-service training and workshop, to enhance the speedy implementation of UBE programme.The result of this study also showed that the teachers accepted utilization of materials for the implementation of UBE programme. The result of this study again showed that materials for the implementation of UBE programme are inadequate and non-functional. Provision for all the materials needed for the implementation of UBE programme in Ogoja Education zone should be made. The limitations of the study were also highlighted and suggestions were made for further research.