An Investigation Of Agricultural Training Competencies Needed In Vocational Colleges In North Rift Region, Kenya

Abstract

The agricultural industry globally is frustrated by chronic mismatch between competencies and work, often leading to economic downturn and youth unemployment. The objective of the study was to assess the extent to which the capacity of trainers influences the quality of teaching of Agriculture in selected TVET colleges. The research method used was descriptive. A total of 384 students in TVET institutions studying agriculture were selected from a population frame of 5 TVET colleges using simple random sampling, 16 teaching staff (principals & lecturers) and 14 human resource personnel were purposively selected. Structured questionnaires and interview schedules were employed in collecting the research data from students and human resource personnel. Focus Group Discussions and Key Informants interviews were used to collect data from lecturers and principals respectively. Cronbach Alpha was used to determine the reliability of the questionnaires and a reliability co-efficient of 0.7 was adopted. Hypothesis testing was done by use of chi square at 95% confidence level. The study found that there was a statistically significant relationship between the capacity of the trainers and the quality of training of agriculture in TVET colleges. This study therefore concluded that agricultural training should be matched with the competencies required by the agricultural organizations. It was therefore recommended that for quality training to be achieved there was need to retrain TVET trainers on the competencies they lacked.