Attitude and competence of teachers in managing guidance and counselling programmes in secondary schools in bureti sub-county, Kericho county, Kenya

Abstract

There are many public secondary schools in Bureti Sub-County. Most of the students in these secondary schools have been facing cases of indiscipline for many years and these cases seem to be increasing as years go by causing a lot of concern to the school management, parents and the communities at large. Although counseling is offered in secondary schools, there has been a rise in indiscipline cases at an alarming rate as experienced especially in 2016. The purpose of this study was to examine the Attitude and Competence of teachers in managing guidance and counselling programmes in secondary schools in Bureti Sub-County, Kericho County, Kenya. The study was guided by the following specific objectives; to investigate the competence of teachers in providing guidance and counselling programmes in secondary schools in Bureti Sub-County and to establish the attitude of students and teachers on guidance and counselling programmes in secondary schools in Bureti Sub-County. The theoretical framework adopted by the study was the Social Learning theory by Albert Bandura (1977) and Operant Conditioning theory by B.F. Skinner (1948). The Social Learning and Operant Conditioning theories were adopted because they help to change the behavior of the students and thus help to reduce indiscipline cases in schools. The target population comprised 52 public secondary schools, 52 head /deputy head teachers, 52 teacher counsellors, 540 teachers and 10532 students. Out of all these, a sample of 10 secondary schools, 10 head/deputy head teachers, 10 teacher counsellors, 108 teachers and 2106 students were selected through the Purposive sampling technique. Stratified Sampling technique was used to select the secondary schools that were studied whereby the strata consisted of mixed day boarding school, mixed day school, boys’ only boarding school, girls’ only boarding school and girls’ only day schools. The instruments that were used to collect the data for the study were questionnaires for head/deputies, teacher counsellors, teachers and students and interview schedules were administered to the teacher counsellors and to deputy head teachers. The data was analyzed using descriptive statistics and tested using Pearson product moment correlation coefficient using Statistical Package of Social Sciences. Questionnaires were analyzed using summary tables for the purpose of data presentation and interpretation. The expected findings were used to guide policy makers in providing guidance and counselling programmes in secondary schools. These findings will be useful in the schools.