STRATEGIES FOR UPGRADING TEACHER EDUCATION IN COLLEGES OF EDUCATION IN ENUGU STATE.

The study determined strategies for upgrading teacher education in colleges of education in Enugu State. Three specific purposes and corresponding research questions guided the study. The researchers adopted a descriptive survey research design for the study. Population for the study consisted of all 423 teacher educators from public colleges of education in Enugu State from which 100 respondents were sampled. Instrument for data collection was a four-point rating scale questionnaire developed by the researchers and titled “Strategies for upgrading teacher education (SUTE)”. The instrument contained 18 items in three clusters based on the three research questions with the options of strongly agree (SA), agree (A) disagree (D) strongly disagree (SD). Three experts in Enugu State College of Education (Technical), Enugu validated the instrument. The reliability of the instrument was determined using Cronbach Alpha method which yielded reliability coefficient values of 0.78, 0.81 and 0.79 for clusters 1- 3 respectively with an overall reliability index of 0.79 which indicated that the instrument was reliable. Mean statistics was used to answer the research questions and decision was based on the cluster mean score in relation to a cut off mean score of 2.50. Findings of the study revealed among others that inadequate funding is a major challenge facing teacher education, providing ongoing professional development opportunities can upgrade teacher education and technology facilitates collaboration among teacher educators and students. Based on these findings, the researchers concluded that there is a great need for the government to upgrade teacher education in Enugu state in order to raise the standard of education especially at college of education that produce teachers for the foundation levels of education. It was recommended that the stake holders of colleges of education should improve on the rate at which fund is approved and release for teacher education, and organize continuous professional development programmes to enhance lecturers' proficiency in teaching of their various courses in their various area of specialization.