Implementation of Admission Guidelines in Colleges of Education in South East, Nigeria

Abstract

The regulation of entry qualification is one of the quality assurance measures in colleges of education. The essence of this measure is to ensure that only candidates with the mental capacity to pursue and complete a course of study in a tertiary institution are admitted into this level of education. The success of any policy measure toward the attainment of its underlying objectives however depends on the level of its implementation. Due to some unpleasant remarks about the quality of some products of teacher education institutions, this study was executed to determine the extent of implementation of some stipulated guidelines for the admission of students into colleges of education in the south East of Nigeria. In order to accomplish the study, the multistage sampling technique was used to draw six colleges out of eleven colleges of education in the area. From the six colleges, 205 academic and non academic staff were drawn out of about 2053 staff. The research data were collected using researchers’ constructed Admission Guidelines Implementation Rating Scale (AGIRS). This instrument has a validity index of .95. It was supplemented by the Admission Guidelines Implementation Interview schedule also constructed by the researchers. The data so collected were analyzed by means of both descriptive and inferential statistics. The findings of the study showed that whereas some stipulated admission guidelines were being implemented to a high degree, the level of implementation of others were low. Also found was a disparity in the level of implementation of stipulated guidelines between federal colleges and privately owned colleges of education. Consequently, it was recommended that the National Commission for Colleges of Education (NCCE) should step up its monitoring and evaluation functions in the colleges with special attention given to the private colleges.