ABSTRACT
Poverty has been a serious problem facing all
society over the years. This paper critically analyses the problems associated
with poverty over the education of the citizens. It also analyses the causes of
poverty and the various programme put in place for poverty alleviation such as
family economic advancement. (FEAP) and poverty alleviation programme (pap) and
various forms in which government has interfered. The question is how far have
these programmes served as veritable instrument of poverty alleviation in the
country? This paper suggests that even though these measures have not achieved
much as poverty alleviation instruments because of their operations
deficiencies, they are nonetheless good instruments that could be improved
upon. This research also has found out that the increase of the crime wave is
as a result of the frustration that the poor get from their deprivation of
education by poverty. Workable and feasible solutions have been proffered for
the problems on educational sector so that qualitative education of the
citizens could be attained.
TABLE OF
CONTENTS
CHAPTER ONE
1.0 Introduction
1.1 The background of the study
1.2 Statement of the problem
1.3 Purpose of the study
1.4 Significance of the study
1.5 Research questions
1.6 Scope of the study
1.7
Definition of term
CHAPTER TWO
2.1
Review of related literature
2.2 Causes of poverty in the society
2.3 The
effective of poverty on educational development of the citizens
2.4 Efforts
to alleviate poverty
2.5 Summary
of literature review
CHAPTER THREE
3.0 Brief outline of the study
3.1
Design of the study
3.2
Area of study
3.3
Population of the study
3.4
Sample of the study
3.5
Instrument for data collection
3.6
Method of data collection
3.7 Validity of instrument
3.8
Distribution and retrieval of the
instrument
3.8
Data analysis technique
CHAPTER FOUR
Presentation
and Analysis of Data
4.1
Presentation and data/findings
4.2 Data analysis
interpretation /Discussion of finding
CHAPTER FIVE
5.1
Summary
5.2
Conclusion
5.3
Recommendations
5.4
Suggestions for further studies
Bibliography
Appendix
A
Appendix
B
CHAPTER ONE
1.0 INTRODUCTION
Formal education in Nigeria has been as old as the coming
of the colonial masters. Its existence is not mysterious. They came in which
the intention of extending their support administration, religion and culture
to west African countries and also with the pretext for engaging in commercial activities
with the inhabitants of those countries.
When they came to the shores of those
countries e.g Nigeria,
they were unfortunately unable to communicate with the people in their
language. They decide to teach the people the way of their life, their language.
So some agreed with them and it makes those that agreed to be wiser than those
that rejected the idea.
Since the formal introduction of
education, it has been identified by some beneficiaries that education is a
librating force, librating people from the crunches of illiteracy,
superstition, inferiority complex and other barbaric actions. But inspite of
all these advantages bequeathed to us by education, it has been infested and
confronted with so many problems which among them include poverty.
Poverty has completely crippled the
development of education in Nigeria.
Right from time when education was formally established in the country with the
imposition of some little amount of money on each student, many people who
would have become the ambassadors and policy makers of this our country could
not afford to pay such money then and it has absolutely jeopardized their
future. The education at that time was left for few who were privileged to be
born into royal family who were engaged in shabby business of slave trade or
the family of wealthy farmers who supplies the European traders the raw
materials they were looking for.
Rather, the government identified that
it has a very big role to play about the education of its citizens. It was
observed that the richness and greatness of country depend on the qualitative
and quantitative education given to the citizens. Now, the government has been
turned out to be an obstacle to education by one allotting a reasonable
percentage of its revenue to the education of the citizens considering their
improverished state.
The
international communities have considered the plight of the citizens of the
developing countries on their educational development and the difficulties
poverty has posed on it. This can be manifestly seen through the activities of
the UNICEF, an organ of the world body U.N.O. This therefore, examined the
incidence on poverty educational development of the Nigeria citizens. Using Federal
Polytechnic Idah student as a case study.
1.1 BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY
The Federal Polytechnic Idah, Kogi state
was established in year 1992 through the collective effort of the community as
a self help project. It is located in the town Lokoja in the Idah local
government area of Kogi state.
The concept, planning and establishment
of the tertiary institution of learning were executed through the supported of
the ministry of justice.
Initially, the institution was approved
by the Kwara state governor as a college of arts and science in 1785. Then, in August 29, 1986, it was
upgraded to college of arts, science and technology.
Later, in year 27th August 1991, Kogi
state was created out from the Kwara state, so the institution now is under
Kogi state (in 1991)
In 1992 the state government got the
federal government approval to upgrade the state polytechnic Idah to federal
polytechnic Idah. The government or governor on administration in that year
(1992) was Alhaji Abubakar Audu.
1.2 STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM
The yardstick to measure the extent of
the educational development of the citizen depends on the reasoning ability of
the people. The behaviour, the approach to solving problems and the physical
appearance of the citizens.
It
is obvious that education is very essential especially now that almost
everybody wants to be educated and enlightened. Many people want to be literate
so as to be able to be informed because he who is not informed is definitely
deformed and he who is deformed is abnormal.
Poverty as a problem does not go alone.
It goes with numerous problem that could be completely inextricable from. It
drags some other problem along such as mal-nutrition, low standard of living,
shabby and tattered diseases. In other words all these problem hinges on
poverty.
Moreover, with the observation of this
problem, Baba Danjuma (2002) viewed that “the pauper lacks the resources to
send his child to school. And even in communities where education is free, the
pauper child still faces an uphill task because the hunger of the body impedes
the proper nourishment of the mind”. From the above explanation, it could be
seen that poverty hinders the proper growth and development of children
intellectually, educationally, psychologically and otherwise.
Persons who have low per capital income
will have their educational development impaired as they cannot have access to
those things that make life worth a living. This study delved into how poverty
affects educational development of the Nigerian citizen with a view to finding
solution to it
1.3 PURPOSE OF THE STUDY
The primary exposes the threats and
hindrances that poverty has posed on education development of the citizens.
To evaluate whether poverty is a
condition that is desirable or undesirable and criteria for measuring poverty.
To ascertain whether the incidence of
poverty on educational development is a seasonal or permanent experience.
To
determine if the existence of poverty is caused by the citizens or the
government or by both or either of them.
To determine and suggest how best to
eradicate poverty and improved the standard of education acquisition among the
citizens.
Finally, to let the citizens understanding
the importance of education in their lives despite the financial constraints.
1.4 SIGNIFICANT OF THE STUDY
This research work is significant in the
sense that it has exposed the needs for poverty alleviation in the country as it
has to do with the life wire of the society and create better awareness about
the threats poverty has posed on our education, other significance includes the
following :-
This piece of work will help us to study
how our country’s development policy can help to reduce the living incidence of
poverty and subsequently improved the educational development of the citizens
thereby eliminating the permanent or seasonal occurrence of poverty in the
midst of its inhabitants. The knowledge gained in this study will help us to
know the extent of the damage poverty caused educational development and ways
through which the anomaly can be ameliorated.
At the end of the findings of this work,
the government should be made to know that it has a role to play in the
abridgement of the income inequality between the rich and the poor so that the
latter could afford the training expenses of their wards.
1.5 RESEARCH QUESTION
1) Poverty
only affects the educational development of the citizens or does it have facts
of life that it trample upon.
2) How
does poverty affect the performance level of Federal Polytechnic Idah student?
3) What
effort have both internal and international government put in place towards
ameliorating poverty and improving the state of education of the poor?
4) What
does the poor do when they do not have access to education or when they do not
or when they are deprived the right to education by poverty?
5) To
what extent does deprivation of education of the poor affects the society
negatively?
1.6 THE SCOPE OF THE STUDY
Because of the plethora of problem
infesting this study, we have decided to concentrate only on the incidence of
poverty on educational development of F.P.I students. It is pertinent to note
that poverty affects other facts of human life for the purpose of this study
the focus is on educational development.
1.7 DEFINITION OF TERMS
F. P.I: Federal Polytechnic, Idah, Kogi State.
INCOME: This
is the money one earns from the work one does or from investment one makes.
PER CAPITAL INCOME:
This is the income which every individual is supposed to earn in a country. It
is calculated by dividing the value of the National Income with the total
number of people (population) in a country.
POVERTY:
A state of having far less limited resources against numerous wants, where a
person is incapable of providing all his basic necessities of life (clothes,
shelter and food).
UNICEF:
United Nations Children Fund.
UNO:
United Nations Organization. A group made up of the rich and developed
countries and some developing countries. It is established to take care of the
world’s political and economic problems.