Preparing Students to Acquire Employable Skills for the Job Market: Perceptions of Teachers and Students about the Effectiveness of the Senior High School Business Management Curriculum

The paper assessed the perceptions of teachers and students with regard to the effectiveness of the Business Management curriculum in Senior High School (SHS) in Ghana. The cross-sectional survey design was employed for the study where the views of 351 students and 30 teachers were sought concerning the potential of the current business management curriculum in preparing students to acquire employable skills. Students and teachers from ten (10) public senior high schools in the Kumasi Metropolis were involved in the study. The ten (10) schools comprised three (3) male SHS, three (3) female SHS and four (4) co-educational (mixed) SHS. A multi-stage sampling procedure and a census technique were used to select respondents who were involved in the study. Questionnaire was the main instrument that was used to collect data. There were two sets of questionnaires (questionnaire for teachers and questionnaire for students). Meanwhile, standard deviation and percentages were the statistical tools that were used for the analysis of data. It emerged from the results that interest in the course, perceived job opportunities in the subject, good mathematics background and perceived ease of subject matter were among the factors that influence students’ decision to choose business as a programme of study in SHS. The study also revealed both teachers and students disagreed with the fact that the nature and content of business management course equipped students with knowledge and skills of dealing with problems in the community in which they would be expected to work after school. The study therefore recommends that stakeholders in education (such as the Ministry of Education and the Ghana Education Service) should consider making huge investments in business education programmes to enable proper training of business students to acquire the needed skills and competencies to create more jobs which will help in reducing the rate of unemployment in Ghana. Furthermore, the National Council for Curriculum and Assessment (NaCCA) which is responsible to develop and review school curriculum should consider the review of the business management curriculum to tailor the content to meet employment requirements in the country.