Vocational, Educational Economic Problems facing secondary school students
Vocational and educational problems may arise when students fail to receive necessary
help related to the two areas. Through provision of educational and vocational guidance,
students may adjust well in school. According to Kochhar (2007), educational guidance
entails all activities related to students‟ adjustment in a learning situation therefore it
helps develop desirable behaviour which will lead to good academic performance and to
solve their educational challenges. This type of guidance helps students in dealing with
issues related to examinations, learning difficulties, study habits, making subject choices
among others. The career choices they will later embark on will be based on some of the
choices made especially those related to the subjects they learnt.
Vocational guidance becomes an area of concern when students start to plan for their
future professions as they require information about the future demands of adopted or
required profession, ways of progress in specific professions, knowledge related to
refresher courses, training programs, and subject choices among other issues. According
to Dash (2003) vocational guidance is the process of helping a person choose, prepare,
and progress in an occupation. Madhukar (2005) similarly defines vocational guidance as
the assistance given to the students in order for them to be in a position to choose and
prepare for a suitable vocation. This also includes providing all the information related to
the world of work such as on job entry, progress and grooming among others.
Therefore, vocational problems are those related to career/vocational choice. Vocational
choice is a developmental task. According to Havighurst (1972) a developmental task is a
task that arises at or about a certain period in an individual‟s life and the successful
achievement of the task leads to a person‟s happiness and success in later tasks; while
failure leads to unhappiness in the individual, disapproval by the society and difficulty
with later life tasks. Therefore, students should be able to make choices on subjects to
study in secondary schools so as to be in a position to enrol in the courses of their choice
in middle level colleges or universities.
In a study to investigate high school students, perception of their problems and their help
seeking preferences, Ongubo, (1987), found that educational and vocational problems
were ranked as the most urgent concerns of the students. Also Nyaegae (2011) on a study
on principals‟ and students‟ attitudes towards guidance and counselling services in the
management of secondary schools of Kisii County found that students have educational
problems such as failure to complete assignments (59.7%), time management (49.5%)
and fear of exam (53.5 %). The educational and vocational problems are at times
compounded by the economic problems learners encounter.
Vocational and educational problems are very common among adolescents especially in
high school since at this stage, a large proportion of them realise that the subjects and
grades they will get in secondary school have a bearing on the courses to undertake in
middle level colleges or at the university. Also in the Kenyan context failure to succeed
academically at this level could spell doom in a person‟s life. Therefore, students feel
that they need to ensure that they address any barriers which may come between them
and their success and hence they are able to identify many of such challenges. Teacher
counsellors and career teachers should ensure that general problems among learners are
handled in group counselling and guidance sessions and this may make learners to feel
free to approach the same teachers when other vocational and educational problems arise.
Economic Problems
Economic problems are very common among secondary school students. These problems
could lead to students lacking necessities required to ensure that they are able to adjust
well and fit in the school environment. The failure to afford basic needs among students
may also give rise to other problems or may impact on them negatively in different
aspects of life. One such area where socio-economic status has been noted to impact on is
performance whereby low socio economic status has been associated with low
performance in school performance (Juma, 2011). Juma further notes that students from
poor backgrounds perform poorly in the examinations because they are mostly in areas
where schools lack important enriching facilities and these poor children may develop an
attitude of helplessness and may feel that being in school is a waste of time. Lack of
finances may make the learner waste time worrying about dropping out of school due to
lack of school fees and other necessities and this may in turn become a student‟s stressor
leading to poor performance.
Another problem that may result from poverty is dropping out of school due to the high
cost of secondary school education in Kenya as this has made some students to cut short
their ambitions as they drop out of high school due to lack of school fees. Others students
also fail to attend high schools of their choice due to high fees charged in such schools
especially if they are among the best performing schools. The problem may go beyond
high school because students of low economic status background who fail to qualify for
the highly rated university courses of their choice under the government sponsorship may
not be in a position to undertake those courses under self-sponsored programmes as the
fees charged are too high to be afforded by ordinary Kenyan citizens.
Considerable local literature exists to show that Kenyan students face problems related to
the different areas discussed above. Kinai (2005) further gave some of the very common
problems among secondary school students as, drug abuse and addiction, alcohol use,
boredom, conflicts, identity crisis, academic problems and delinquent behaviour among
others. Other problem behaviours and some scenarios experienced in secondary schools
in Kenya include, rampant demonstrations and riots, suspensions and expulsions from
schools, low academic achievements and career choice difficulties and developmental
problems (Mokogi, 2008). The issue of
student‟s behaviour problems in secondary schools in Kenya is not just a concern of the
last few months but the subject has long been debated and has featured repeatedly on
schools as well as national agendas. Despite the rise in indiscipline cases, corporal
punishment was abolished in Kenyan schools in 2001. This made the Ministry of
Education to come up with strategies for solving the challenges in the secondary schools
and a lot of emphasis has been placed on the use of guidance and counselling with
behaviour modification in schools (Republic of Kenya, 1999). Due to the above
mentioned incidences in most Kenyan schools, there is therefore need to ensure that
learners are willing to consult the teacher counsellors when in difficult situations.
