Academic Programme Development and the Participation of Relevant Interest Groups for Quality Manpower Production in Nigeria Higher Education

Abstract

Quality manpower production is not just essential for national development, but very critical to national security and

quick economic recovery in most of today’s fragile economies of the world. This paper assessed the participation of

prospective employers as relevant interest groups in the development of academic programmes in tertiary institutions and

the adequacy of the skilled manpower being produced from these programmes in meeting the manpower needs of the economy.

Academic Programme Development Evaluation Questionnaire (APDEQ) was designed, validated, tested for reliability (with an

r-coefficient of 0.82) and administered on a stratified random sample of 88 Heads of Academic Units (HAU) of three

categories of tertiary institutions (100% of population) and 35 Human Resources Managers (HRM) of five categories of

companies (30% of population) within the Trans-Amadi Industrial Layout in Port Harcourt, Nigeria. Two research questions

and one hypothesis were raised. The analysis of the survey results using weighted mean opinion and t-test statistics

revealed that prospective employers of labour are not maximally participating in academic programme development in

tertiary institutions and such programmes are not adequate in developing the quality of skilled manpower needed to meet

the specific needs of these prospective employers, The implications of this result was discussed and the researchers

concluded that the quality manpower production which is needed to address the rising graduate unemployment phenomenon

cannot be achieved without the active participation of relevant interest groups in the development of academic programmes.

Such programmes must then guide the production of adequate skilled manpower to meet the specific needs of the economy. The

need to take concrete steps, both by the tertiary institutions and appropriate professional and regulatory bodies to

actualize these were recommended.