ASSESSMENT OF THE IMPLEMENTATION OF THE UNIVERSAL BASIC EDUCATION IN IMO STATE, NIGERIA

Abstract

The study focused on the extent to which free Universal Basic Education programme is implemented in Imo state, Nigeria. Two research questions and one hypothesis guided the study. The study adopted the descriptive survey research design. The population of the study was 501 staff consisting of 216 Staff of Imo State Universal Basic Education Board and 285 staff of the Ministry of Education. The sample size of the study was 130 representing 26% of the population drawn using the stratified random sampling techniques. The instruments for data collection were checklist and a self structured questionnaire titled Assessing Free Universal Basic Education Scale (AFUBES) which was validated by experts in Educational Management and Measurement and Evaluation with a reliability index of 0.85 obtained using test re-test method. Percentage, mean and standard deviations were used to answer the research questions while z-test was used to test the hypotheses at 0.05 level of significance. The findings revealed among others that the UBE programme in Imo Sate, Nigeria is partially free. The study concluded among others that there should be a significant increase in the budgetary allocation to the education sectors.