INFORMATION SOURCES AND CAREER CHOICE AMONG SECONDARY SCHOOL STUDENTS (EDUCATION PROJECT TOPICS AND MATERIALS)
CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
- Background of the Study
In almost every area of human academic endeavour information of different types are required to progress steadily. These information services could be of educational, personal – social and vocational in nature.
Experiences in recent years have shown that students in our secondary schools do not really bother about their subjects combination, let alone the relevance or relationship of such subjects combination to their future course of study in higher institution or how it is related to their choice of future career.
This trend has found deep roots in the lives of most students either because of lack of interest, ignorance, improper / inexperienced guidance, lack of exposure as well as lack of adequate skills and the necessary abilities to acquire or retrieve these information services from where they could be found.
One’s career is an important item used for his identity and status in today’s world, his lifestyles and his fads which always undergo change, mainly because of modern technology. It also provides pattern of association, a means for recognition and meaningful life experience. The social stand of most adults in our contemporary society is intimately linked to the prestige of their occupation and reputation they establish at work. Thus a person’s career determines to a great extent his choice of friends, lifestyle, type of house he lives, the type of wife he marries, the school his children attend among others. This implies that when one chooses a career he is indirectly choosing a lifestyle.
So important is one’s career that any adult without one is looked upon as a social misfit and under achiever. The truth is that, people seem to be identified more by what they do for a living than by their residence/home town. Onyejiaku (2001) asserts the word “career” as a term with different connotation or meaning in different disciplines. Some confine the term to a single vocation, others define it as a sequence of occupations and a position an individual holds during his life time, thereby equating career with life itself. The authors (Onyejiaku 2001) notes in general term that career should be conceived as a general course of action or progress of a person through life normally expressed in some professions to include both work and non-work factors, otherwise referred to as a person total life pattern.
