THE STATUS OF VOCATIONAL HOME ECONOMICS CURRICULUM IMPLEMENTATION IN A NIGERIAN UNIVERSITY IN SOUTHWESTERN NIGERIA

The implementation of vocational curriculum at the university level has been of great concern over the years in the vocational field. Despite various efforts made in literature to improve the curriculum delivery of the subject like Creative Arts and Home economics, criticisms still abound on implementation. The research therefore examined the status of vocational Home Economics curriculum as one of the vocational courses available in a few universities in Nigeria. The study is a descriptive survey of the expost-facto type. Six research questions and two null hypotheses were raised in the study. The sample for the study comprised 82 vocational education undergraduates, 20 vocational staff making a total sample of 102 respondents selected from a university of education in southwestern Nigeria. Two questionnaires used for data collection are Home Economics Curriculum Implementation Questionnaire (HECIQ) with a reliability coefficient of 0.60 and Students Attitude to Home Economics Questionnaire (SHEQ) with reliability coefficient of 0.80. The results revealed among others that: there is inadequacy in the methodology of the curriculum implementation; the resources available are not adequate enough; female students have better attitude to home economics than male; there is no significant difference in the vocational staff rating of the adequacy of Home Economics objectives. Female students have a higher mean score of 18.2407 on their attitude to Home economics curriculum when compared with a mean score of 18.1395 for the male. It was recommended that the methods of teaching Home economics should be improved upon by vocational staff with adequate supply and utilization of relevant human and non-human resources for Home economics teaching at the university level.