Abstract
M.A.
There is a serious need for effective career guidance programmes in schools.
Most of the research point out that the need is more evident in African
schools. This can be linked to the high school dropout rate, resulting in
unemployment and a low quality of life in some sectors of the population.
Other factors like poverty and parents’ socio -economic status plays a part.
This study sees the school as the most important setting and environment that
is responsible for developing and promoting quality career development
programmes that will produce learners that are going to be self-reliant in
life. For such programmes to address the needs of the learners, they should
be developmental in nature. Some of the characteristics of a developmental
career development programme are that it takes all children in the school into
consideration. It also has a preventative emphasis.
The study raises concerns about the nature of career development in schools
and whether their programmes are developmental in nature. The training of
the guidance counsellors, as they are responsible for programme
development, is also an issue. The study therefore describes at length a
developmental career guidance programme, its characteristics, principles on
which it is based and implementation.
The psycho-education model is seen as a proper vehicle for training and for
enhancing the skills of the guidance counsellors. A training manual in career
development was developed as an intervention process in this study. Ten
teachers who were firstly interviewed to assess their level of knowledge and
training on career development were trained using this manual. The teachers
were then interviewed, and gave a descriptive account of the knowledge
acquired from the training.
The results are discussed with reference to the theory and literature that are
put forward in this study. The evaluation of the intervention of the study,
which was the training manual, was positive. The teachers described it as
helpful and easy to apply.