ABSTRACT

POVERTY HAS BEEN A SERIOUS PROBLEM FACING ALL SOCIETY OVER THE YEARS. THIS PAPER CRITICALLY ANALYSES THE CONCEPTUAL PROBLEMS ASSOCIATED WITH POVERTY OVER THE EDUCATION OF THE CITIZENS. IT ALSO ANALYSES THE CAUSES OF POVERTY AND THE VARIOUS PROGRAMME PUT IN PLACE FOR POVERTY ALLEVIATION SUCH AS FAMILY ECONOMIC ADVANCEMENT. (FEAP) AND POVERTY ALLEVIATION PROGRAMME (PAP) AND VARIOUS FORMS IN WHICH GOVERNMENT HAS INTERFERED. THE QUESTION IS, HOW FAR HAVE THESE PROGRAMMES SERVED AS VERITABLE INSTRUMENT OF POVERTY ALLEVIATION IN THE COUNTRY? THIS PAPER SUGGESTS THAT EVEN THOUGH THESE MEASURES HAVE NOT ACHIEVED MUCH AS POVERTY ALLEVIATION INSTRUMENTS BECAUSE OF THEIR OPERATIONS DEFICIENCIES, THEY ARE NONETHELESS GOOD INSTRUMENTS THAT COULD BE IMPROVED UPON. THIS RESEARCH ALSO HAS FOUND OUT THAT THE INCREASE OF THE CRIME WAVE IS AS A RESULT OF THE FRUSTRATION THAT THE POOR GET FROM THEIR DEPRIVATION OF EDUCATION BY POVERTY. WORKABLE AND FEASIBLE SOLUTIONS HAVE BEEN PROFFERED FOR THE PROBLEMS ON EDUCATIONAL SECTOR SO THAT QUALITATIVE EDUCATION OF THE CITIZENS COULD BE ATTAINED.

CHAPTER ONE     -      INTRODUCTION

1.1      INTRODUCTION/BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY

       This work is based on the effect of poverty on educational development of the citizens with a particular reference to Federal Polytechnic Oko in Anambra State.

       The effect of poverty here is those things that can bring ineffective growth in the educational development of the citizens. It is pertinent to know that poverty in any establishment hampered achievement of its targeted objectives.

       Educations of the citizens are faced with numerous problems which in turn affect the growth of such establishment. It is the therefore in the light of the forgoing that aroused my interest to embark on this research study with a view to finding out the effects, causes and suggest possible solutions to the effect of poverty on educational development of the citizens with a particular reference to Federal Polytechnic, Oko students, Anambra state.

       Nevertheless, formal education in Nigeria has been as old as the coming of the colonial masters. Its existence is not mysterious. They came in with the intention of extending their superior administration, religion and culture to West African countries and also with the intention of engaging in commercial activities with the inhabitants of those countries. When they came to the shores of these countries e.g Nigeria, they were unfortunately unable to communicate with the people in their language. They devised to teach the people the ways of their life, their language, so some agreed with them and it makes those that agree to be wiser than those that rejected the idea.

       Since the formal introduction of education, it has been identified by some beneficiaries that education is a librating force, librating people from the crunches of illiteracy, superstition, inferiority complex and other barbaric actions. But inspite of all these advantages bequeathed to us by education, it has been infested and confronted with so many problems which among them include poverty.

       Poverty has completely crippled the development of education in Nigeria. Right from time when education was formally established in the country with the imposition of some little amount of money on each student, many people who would have become the ambassadors and policy makers of this our country could not afford to pay such money then and it has absolutely jeopardized their future. The education at that time was left for few who were privileged to be born into royal family who were engaged in shabby business of slave trade or the family of wealthy farmers who supplies the European traders the raw materials they were looking for.

       Furthermore, the government later identified that it has a very big role to play about the education of its citizens. It was observed that the richness and greatness of country depend on the qualitative and quantitative education given to the citizens. Now, the government has been turned out to be an obstacle to education by one allotting a reasonable percentage of its revenue to the education of the citizens. The international communities have considered the plight of the citizens of the developing countries on their educational development and the difficulties poverty has posed on it. This can be manifestly seen through the activities of the UNICEF, an organ of the world body U.N.O. This therefore, examined the effect on poverty educational development of the Nigeria citizens. Using Federal Polytechnic Oko student as a case study.

1.2  STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM

       The yardstick to measure the extent of the educational development of the citizen depends on the reasoning ability of the people. The behaviour, the approach to solving problems and the physical appearance of the citizens. It is obvious that education is very essential especially now that almost everybody wants to be educated and enlightened. Many people want to be literate so as to be able to be informed because he who is not informed is definitely deformed and he who is deformed is abnormal.

       What motivates the researcher to write on this topic is that, poverty as a problem does not go alone. It goes with numerous problems that could be completely inextricable from it. It drags some other problems along such as malnutrition, low standard of living, shabby and tattered dresses.

       Furthermore, with the observation of this problem, Baba Danjuma (2002) viewed that “the pauper lacks the resources to send his child to school. And even in communities where education is free, the pauper child still faces an uphill task because the hunger of the body impedes the proper nourishment of the mind”. From the above explanation, it could be seen that poverty hinders the proper growth and development of children intellectually, educationally, psychologically and otherwise.

       Persons who have low per capital income will have their educational development impaired as they cannot have access to those things that make life worth a living. This study delved into how poverty affects educational development of the Nigerian citizen with a view to finding solution to it

1.3  PURPOSE OF THE STUDY

       The primary objective of this work is to expose the threats and hindrances that poverty has posed on education development of the citizens.

       To evaluate whether poverty is a condition that is desirable or undesirable and criteria for measuring poverty.

       To ascertain whether the effect of poverty on educational development is a seasonal or permanent experience. Also to determine if the existence of poverty is caused by the citizens or the government or by both or either of them.

       Also, to determine and suggest how best to eradicate poverty and improved the standard of education acquisition among the citizen.

       Finally, to let the citizens understand the importance of education in their lives despite the financial constraints.

1.4  SIGNIFICANT OF THE STUDY

       This research work is significant in the sense that it has exposed the needs for poverty alleviation in the country a sit has to do with the life wire of the society and create better awareness about the threats poverty has posed on our education.

       Moreover, this work will help us to study how our country’s development policy can help to reduce the effect of poverty and subsequently improved the educational development of the citizens thereby eliminating the permanent or seasonal occurrence of poverty in the midst of its inhabitants. The knowledge gained in this study will help us to know the extent of the damage poverty caused educational development and ways through which the anomaly can be ameliorated.

       At the end of the findings of this work, the government should be made to know that it has a role to play in the abridgement of the income inequality between the rich and the poor so that the latter could afford the training expenses of their wards.

1.5  RESEARCH QUESTION

       This study shall carry out on the following research questions.

1)          How does poverty affect the performance level of Federal Polytechnic Oko student?

2)          What do the citizens do when they do not have access to education as a result of poverty?

3)          Has the Federal Government or international organization helped in reducing poverty and improving the state of education of the poor?

1.5  THE SCOPE OF THE STUDY

       As a result of the plethora of problems infesting this study, the researcher has decided to concentrate only on the effect of poverty on educational development of F.P.O student. It is pertinent to note that poverty affects other facts of human life but for the purpose of this study, the focus is on educational development.

1.7  DEFINITION TERMS

F. P.O Federal Polytechnic, Oko. This is the institution where the researcher carried out her work.

PER CAPITAL INCOME: This is the income which every individual is supposed to earn in a country. It is calculated by dividing the value of the National Income with the total number of people (population) in a country.

INCOME: This is the money one earns or get from the work he/she did or from investment one make.

UNICEF: United Nations Children Fund.

UNO: United Nations Organization. A group made up of the rich and developed countries and some developing countries. It is established to take care of the world’s political and economic problems.

POVERTY: This is a state of having far less limited resources against numerous wants, where a person is incapable to providing all his basic necessities of life like food, clothes and shelter.