SENSITIZATION OF SECONDARY SCHOOL STUDENTS IN IGBO CORE VALUES: A PANACEA FOR THE SOCIAL VICES IN CONTEMPORARY SOUTH EASTERN GEOGRAPHICAL ZONE OF NIGERIA: A CASE STUDY OF IMO AND EBONYI STATES OF NIGERIA

Abstract

The study investigated the sensitization of secondary school students in Igbo core values: A panacea for the social vices in contemporary South Eastern Geographical Zone of Nigeria: A case study of Imo and Ebonyi States of Nigeria. Three research questions guided the study and three hypotheses were tested at the 0.05 level of significance. A descriptive survey research design was adopted for the study. The population of this study comprised all the 158,572 senior secondary class SS 3 students in Imo and Ebonyi States. A sample size of 500 SS 3 students was drawn for the study using a stratified random sampling technique. An instrument titled Impact of Igbo Values Sensitization on Behaviour Assessment Questionnaire (IIVSBAQ) was used for data collection. The face and content validation of the instrument was determined by two experts in the Department of Test, Measurement and Evaluation in the Federal College of Education, Obudu. The reliability of the instrument was ascertained through the Cronbach Alpha method, which yielded an overall coefficient of 0.728. Mean and standard deviation were used to answer the research questions and the t-test was used to test the hypotheses. The findings of the study revealed, among others, that patience and hard work do not impact the behaviours of the Igbo-born students of South South-Eastern geographical zone of Nigeria. It was also found that honesty does impact the behaviours of the Igbo-born students of South South-Eastern geographical zone of Nigeria.  Further results indicated that there is no significant difference in the mean score of male and female students on the impact of patience and honesty on the behaviour of Igbo-born students of South South-Eastern geographical zone of Nigeria. Based on the findings, it was recommended among others that the various levels of government in Nigeria, including the Local government, state and federal governments should take the sensitization of our cultural heritages including our core values very serious by making sure that it is studied in all the levels of our educational level up to the tertiary levels, including our polytechnic and monotechnics, to make sure that every child in the school system has a good learning and knowledge of our core values.