Acquisition of Economic and Soft Skills among OVC in Southwestern Nigeria

The achievement of the goal of primary education in Nigeria, which targets giving every child the opportunities to develop life manipulative skills, has been a challenge among primary school leavers, most especially the Orphan and Vulnerable Children (OVC). In most cases, the limited resource accessible to the homes has not allow giving the OVC educational opportunity to secondary level. Despite the introduction of some pre-vocational subjects such as Home Economics and Agriculture into the primary school, there is no empirical or physical evidence to show that the pupils are equipped with much life manipulatives skills such as economic and soft skills. This study adopted descriptive survey to investigate the acquisition of economic and soft skills among OVC in some selected southwestern states of Nigeria. The study reveals that the economic skills of the OVC pupils were fairly developed (mean = 1.52). The economic sub-skills of endurance (Mean = 1.57) and self-dependence (mean = 1.51) were the most and least developed respectively. The soft skills of the OVC pupils were fairly developed (mean = 1.76) among other findings. Appropriate recommendations were proffered to enhance the development of economic and soft skills among the OVC in southwestern Nigeria.