Relevance of the Senior High School Curriculum in Ghana in Relation to Contextual Reality of the World of Work

Abstract

The mass unemployment of the youth toady has mostly been attributed to the irrelevance of the school curriculum. However, the skills in the curriculum have not been subjected to critical analysis to empirically prove their relevance or otherwise. The purpose of the study was therefore to identify the skills embedded in the curriculum, those skills the learners have acquired and those that employers usually demand of employees by relating them to empirical findings of the skills employers in general demand of employees. A conceptual content analysis was used to determine the skills embedded in the curriculum. Purposive sampling procedure was used to select twenty-one students and fourteen key informants for an interview. The data from the interview were sorted out into themes and coded through the use of NVivo 8 to help in the counting of frequencies of each skill. It was found out that the senior high school curriculum, though was generally rated as relevant, the skills with the highest frequencies in the curriculum focused on attitudes and values while those required by employers focused on the application of knowledge. On the basis of these findings, it can be concluded that the curriculum is relevant in instilling values into the students but it is not relevant in the application of knowledge that employers usually demand of employees at the work environment.