THE EFFECT OF IN-SERVICE TRAINING ON TEACHERS PRODUCTIVITY IN SECONDARY SCHOOLS

CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

1.1 Background to the Study

Staff training must be based on a need analysis that compares current performance and behavior to needed performance and conduct. Staff training is one of the most important ways organizations invest in their employees for a higher return today and in the future.

The efficient and effective performance of the personnel that makes up the organization is the foundation of organizational efficiency (Ahmed, 2020). The richness of the workforce's knowledge, skills, and capacities, in turn, depends on the workforce's efficient and successful performance. In most businesses, in-service training is a constant act/exercise. The inexorable march of time, combined with the never-ending glitter of societal change, makes flexibility and ongoing workforce preparation as necessary as initial knowledge and skills training (Max, 2020). This cannot occur if personnel are not trained in a business. Every executive, manager, or supervisor in a public or private company has the obligation, and indeed the legal duty, to ensure the growth of their personnel who have the necessary knowledge and competence in order to optimize the organization's production and efficiency.

Training is similar to honing an existing skill in order to reflect technological trends and other social–cultural environmental changes in an organization. Productivity is the objective of today's competitive corporate environment, and training may help you get there. The goal is for them to be able to contribute fully to the organization's welfare, health, and progress (Onah 1993). The primary goal of training and development in a service company is to promote staff efficiency, which leads to a rise in corporate productivity. This explains why a business expects a huge amount of funds and time at one time or in the order in the improvement of the abilities of their personnel at various levels.

According to Akpan (1982:128), the primary goal of training is to provide individuals with the information needed to qualify them for a certain job of work or to enhance their skills and efficiency in the position they now occupy. As a result, staff training enhances their effectiveness and efficiency.

Teachers, like other professions, may be required to continue their education after they have earned their credentials, a process called as ongoing professional development. As a result, the study aims to investigate the influence of in-service training on teacher performance in secondary schools in Nigeria, with a focus on selected secondary schools in Keffi, Nasarawa State.

1.2 Statement of the Problem

The teaching profession has lacked a clear career path, which has had far-reaching consequences for working conditions, performance, and people development. The manner in which teachers instruct has a direct influence on the learning results. As a result, investing in teachers is critical to achieving high-quality education. Teachers on active duty are required to improve on a constant basis through upgrading, refresher courses, induction, ethical and moral training, workshops, seminars, and/or research.

Despite the fact that the ministry, government officials, and school administrators in government-aided secondary schools in Nigeria are expected to provide training for their personnel at various levels, some schools have not done so. This has resulted in a lack of morale among teachers, an inability to teach new subjects they have never qualified for, such as entrepreneurship, a lack of quality assurance procedures and strategies in the orientation to and implementation of new curriculum, teachers funding them for training in fields unrelated to the teaching profession, and increased absenteeism from duty. It is merely sad that no research has been conducted to determine the influence of training on instructors' job behavior.

1.3 Purpose of the study

The purpose of this study includes the following:

i. To examine the relationship between in-service training programme and teachers pedagogical skills in secondary schools.

ii. To ascertain the relationship in service training of teachers and academic performance of students in secondary schools.

1.4 Significance of study

The research work must be noteworthy in several respects.

To begin with, it is believed that research into this large area of study would reveal numerous previously prevalent truths and which past scholars in this subject have failed to pursue. This research will thus contribute to a better understanding of the in-service training program, particularly as it relates to teacher productivity in secondary schools in Nasarawa State.

Second, the application of the basic tenets of this research study in general, and the body of facts in particular, will significantly improve government efforts to ensure systematic re-training programs for teachers currently working in secondary schools across the country in general, and Federal Government College Keffi in particular.

It will also contribute to government efforts to ensure sound, more effective, and efficient teachers, which will improve the society's falling standard of education and contribute to high academic performance of students in secondary schools, who will be leaders in various capacities of human endeavors.

Furthermore, the study will aid policymakers and educational planners in creating a more variable teaching and learning environment, as well as an educational system that will allow the country to overcome the current challenge of globalization, with its emphasis on professionalism and increased productivity.

Finally, the study will benefit both students and researchers since it will contribute to the current literature, adding to the body of information in this subject, and because it will give inputs into the researchers' studies, increasing their expertise.

1.5  Research questions

The following research question has been formulated to guide the study.

i. Does in service training programme improve teacher’s pedagogical skills?

ii. Does in service training of teacher lead to improved academic performance of students in secondary schools?

1.6 Scope and Delimitation of the study

For the purpose of the study the researcher has limited the study to secondary schools in Keffi metropolis of Nasarawa State. Generally, every research study like all other investigation both public and private is often bedecked with numerous constraints.

This particularly work is not an exemption, thus many administrative bottle necks posed severe threat to the continuity of the study.

The geographical distance between the various schools in the area of the research constituted serious transportation problem.

The study has been inheritably hindered by the lean purse and economic depression that bite seriously on the researchers.

1.9 Definition of terms

In-service Training

According to the United State of America Department of Education (1985) in service training is a system of systematized activities promoted and directed by the school system that contribute to the professional or occupational growth and competence of staff members during the time of their service to the school system.