| dc.description.abstract | Youth unemployment has for a long time been a challenge in the world. In Sub Saharan
Africa alone it accounts for approximately 60 percent (World Bank report, 2009). Data from
KIHBS shows that approximately 21 percent of youth aged between15-29 are neither in school
or employed. Those who are lucky to be employed take orders and follow rules imposed to them
by others thus exposing them to a lot of exploitation. In Kenya, the youth account for 60% of its
population(2009 census) majority of this population are out of school, lack skills, are
unemployed and are a time bomb if not accommodated in mainstream social, economic and
political processes of development (NYP, 2006). Vocational training has been recommended as
an option to solve youth unemployment and dependency problems through imparting
employable skill in these youth. The YPs came up as a community initiative under the auspices
of NCCK in 1968 to absorb those who had dropped out of school. Their well being was fully
dependent on community well wishers. Government initiative to rejuvenate the YPs began in the
year 2007 after the creation of the Ministry of Youth Affairs and Sports, after recommendations
of the National Conference on Education and Training of 2003 that developed Sessional paper
number 5, a policy framework on Education Training and Research. Through the department of
youth training the government embarked on a mission to revamp these vocational institutions so
as to make them attractive to the prospective youth trainees and improve quality of training. This
was through: changing their name from village polytechnics to youth polytechnics, developing
infrastructure, providing training materials, modern tools and equipment, hiring instructors and
subsidizing tuition fees (MOYA, 2012). Majority of the YPs are located in rural areas and target
disadvantaged youth who did not make it to complete basic education. Their goal is to impart
technical and employable skills to these youth so that they can be independent either through self
employment or being employed elsewhere and contribute to national development. The study
seeks to examine the influence of these government programs of revamping the YPs on youth
skill development. The objectives of the study will be to establish how Subsidized Tuition Fund,
provision of infrastructure, tools and equipment, human resources and course content has
influenced youth skill development in the public YPs in Samia sub county-Busia County and
their relevance in imparting employable skills in the youths. The target population will comprise
of YP trainees, instructors and training officer within Samia Sub County. Sampling will be both
random and purposive. Data will be collected using descriptive survey (interview and
questionnaire) and analyzed using descriptive technique thematically. | en_US |
