Have you ever been in a learning environment where you do not understand anything about the course being taught and of what help the course could be for you in future? This is the experience most students go through when they leave secondary school for any higher institution of learning. Ignorance, lack of academic orientation and poor parental guidance has landed many students into fields of study they know nothing about or are not willing to pursue in the future.
At times, the socio-economic and academic capabilities of some students has been measured using information about their parents' occupation, parents’ level of education or household income. Students, mostly adolescents, which is that developmental stage characterised by a search for and a move into individual life tracks; a shift of focus from socio-economic and academic position of origin to socio-economic and academic position of destination is at times justified. But most parents and societal actors have wrongly applied academic orientation which is used as that rough indicator to future social position of some children. This accounts for why some students find themselves studying courses they can hardly have a pass grade from one level to another.
Parental involvement in the education of children is very frustrating in some cases. Because some parents are medical doctors’ or engineers, they influence their children to follow their foot steps. Thereby influencing their academic choices. Here is Miriam F, student in Yaounde, whose dad is a lawyer and wanted her to follow his footsteps in the legal profession. In spite of efforts put in by Miriam, she is still lagging behind in a course she was supposed to have finished three years back. Miriam is in her sixth year in the legal department of the University of Yaounde II, Soa.
There are students who do not even know that they have to be orientated before choosing a future career. Whereas, there are those who prefer to ignore the advice of academic counsellors and decide to follow their friends’ advice without knowing what lies ahead. Although certain measures have been put in place by university institutions and the Ministry of Secondary Education to better orientate students into their future careers, like the training and deploying of guidance counsellors, there are still several loopholes. It is said that some of the guidance counsellors in some secondary schools do not even have an office where they can attend to students. Meanwhile, some of them do not go to the schools they are posted causing a scarcity in the sector.
