Abstract:
The study was carried out to evaluate the metal work trades of the vocational training programme of prison inmates in Plateau State. An evaluation research design was used. The population for the study comprised 12 principal officers, 14 metalwork trade instructors and 59 prison inmates. The instrument used for data collection was structured questionnaire. Five research questions guided the study while three null hypotheses were formulated. Frequency, percentage, mean and standard deviation were used to analyze the data for answering research questions while analysis of variance was used to test the hypotheses of no significant difference at 0.05 level of significance. Cronbach alpha reliability method was used to establish the reliability of the instrument and 0.86 was obtained. The study found that nine criteria were used for assigning prison inmates of the reformatory institutions into the various vocations or trades, metal work vocational training instructors in the reformatory programme in Plateau State possessed four types of qualifications to include city and guilds, labour trade grade III, ordinary national diploma and Bachelor of technology, metal work training facilities in the reformatory institutions in plateau State are fairly adequate, curriculum of metalwork trade training programme for prison inmates is adequate and the guidance service programme for prison inmates of the reformatory institutions has eleven statuses. The study also found that: (a) there was no significant difference between the mean responses of the principal officers, instructors and inmates of the reformatory institution on the criteria for assigning prison inmates of the reformatory institutions into the various vocations or trades. (b) there was no significant difference between the mean responses of the principal officers, instructors and inmates of the reformatory institution on the adequacy of the curriculum of metal work training programme in reformatory institutions in Plateau State. (c) There was no significant difference between the mean responses of the principal officers, instructors and inmates of the reformatory institution on the status of the guidance service programme for prison inmates of the reformatory institutions. It was recommended that adequate metalwork training facilities should be provided by government to various prison institutions for proper rehabilitation of inmates. It was also recommended that metalwork trade instructors should be retrained by government or prison authority so that proper training can take place.
