INFLUENCE OF PARENTAL OCCUPATION ON CAREER CHOICE AMONG SENIOR SECONDARY SCHOOL STUDENTS

CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY

Parental occupation is one of the key factors that determine a child’s/students decision career choice. Parental occupation and student’s choice of career mostly centers on the parent level of education, which is to a large extent correlated to a student’s socioeconomic status, rather than the parent’s field of work and area of specialization. Parents’ socioeconomic status has largely pronounced to have an indirect influence on students’ career choice, success in college because it influences the pre-college factors experienced by the students. There is this adage that says “If you chose the career you love, you don’t have to work a single day in your life “. This simply signifies that choosing a career can be very pleasing if you have actually made the right choice. And it can be challenging when the decision is made wrongly. Once you choose wrongly, or as a result of your parents wish or desire, it can leave you wishing that you had taken a different path all together. To a lay man understanding, career is has been defined as a number of events that make up life a life. It is the number of career activities and other life tasks that when put together define a person’s devotion to work for his or her overall pattern of self – development.

Without any question, choosing the right career can be an overwhelming task that can make one loose confident specifically in a world which refers an array of paths, all of which seem to be heading to a golden and flourishing goal. Careers can also make or break a person, therefore choosing a career is one of the biggest and most important decisions one has to make in life. If you take a wrong career path or listen to the wrong ear when it comes to choosing a career, you will have a great chance of ending up a broken person. Career choices are mostly influenced by parental occupation, socio-economic factors, mental and physical abilities, personal characteristics and the opportunities to which persons are exposed. Career guidance and maturity from parents, etc is seen in the successful achievement of age and stage developmental tasks across the life span. This is a major concept in some theories.

Like we have said earlier, career choice is a big decision that will forever influence one throughout their lives. The choice and selection of career has been a serious problem and challenging taskamong the secondary school students in Nigeria. Irrespective of ones age, the choice of career or desire is avital question for everybody. A lot of student in secondary schools grow up with this positive mindset that their future is sure and secured and they are bound to succeed, without knowing that they ought to work hard and take decisions wisely to achieve their big dream. Majority come up with the notion that they would be able to work in the public or private establishments immediately they complete secondary school education. While some have detailed arrangement to become lawyers, engineers, medical doctors, accountants, to mention but a few. Students in secondary schools like many other young adults are always disturbed about what they will do with their lives aer school, the kind of adult they will turn into. They are disturbed about their introduction into the occupational world and finding eective, eicient and rewarding places in and out immediately, swi revolving societies where wages employment is improbable to be available on a scale enough to take in more than a small number of the young people when they do arrive at the labour market. How the young people of today meet the problems of tomorrow will to a great extent rely on the amount of success they make in planning and choosing their career and also the person they listened to while trying to make the big decision. Planning for tomorrow itself is majorly the duties of the parents, teachers and school counselor. Students need general orientation and exposure into the world of work through the curriculum. The choice of career is a fragile, meaning that it can break if not handled in the right way. It requires carefulness and serious considerations. The kind of career the youths chase can influence their lives in diverse ways. It can define where the individual lives and the type of friends kept. It can display or show how much education one will have and define the amount of money one will earn. People attitudes towards choosing a career diers, many people wish themselves high income; while others want exciting experiences while some others want to serve people to make the world a better place. Every student has an unequaled, special history of their past and this defines how they see the world.

STATEMENT OF THE GENERAL PROBLEM

The standard of education in Nigeria today is gradually falling thus leading to lots of arrangements amongst scholars civil servants, educational planners etc as to what is the immediate and remote causes of the failure and the factors hindering high standard of education, while we may be quick to blame government, teachers, and children, parents and the family which students comes from leave much to be desired. It is important to note that we cannot exonerate parents of these children when talking about the students’ choice of career in secondary school. Parental occupation of parental factors found to have influence the students’ choice of career is based on parental educational status.