An Evaluation of Guidance and Counselling Programmes

Guidance and counselling in secondary schools in Kenya pre-dates independence in 1963. Schools in Olkalou Nyandarua County are faced with numerous student problems requiring comprehensive guidance and counselling. Student problems range from juvenile delinquency to outright crime. Proportionate, stratified and simple random sampling methods sufficed for selecting representative sample. Some 220 respondents comprising 200 students, 10 teacher counsellors and 10 head teachers were used. Research instruments included questionnaires developed by the researcher and validated through piloting in Nakuru District. Cronbachs coefficient alpha at 0.72 was achieved as the reliability level. Data was analysed with computer software SPSS- 12.0.1 for Windows. Study found that majority of teacher counsellors had no professional training in guidance and counselling. Majority of students and teachers did not take guidance and counselling programmes seriously. The challenges in the course of guidance and counselling of students was lack of job motivation for teacher-counsellors, lack of cooperation from students and inadequate professional training opportunities for teacher counselors.