A Survey of National Values Awareness and Erosion Among Secondary School Students in Niger State: Implication for National Patriotism Counselling

The thrust of this study focused on investigating the level of awareness and erosion of national values in school children and its implications for national patriotism. Descriptive survey research design was adopted for the study. The population comprises of all secondary school students in Niger State. A sample size of 1,270 students was randomly selected across the three senatorial districts of the state. A self-developed questionnaire titled ‘Nigeria’s Nationalism Scale’ was used to obtain information for the study from the respondents. The instrument was validated and a reliability index of 0.87 was obtained. Descriptive statistics of percentage was used in answering the research questions while inferential statistics of t-test and linear regression were used to test the hypotheses. Findings revealed that secondary school students in Niger state have a higher level of national values awareness and both value awareness level and level of value erosion have significant influence on patriotism. The study recommended among others that counsellors should be employed and adequately be provided with necessary facility and fund to complement the effort of the civic and social studies teachers in re-orientating the school students in Niger state on national values.