Soft Skills and Academic Resilience Among Secondary School Students in Akwa Ibom State, Nigeria

Abstract

This study examined the linear relationship between the components of soft skills (communication skill, problem solving skill, critical thinking skill, and time management skill) and the component of academic resilience (confidence, self-control, composure, and commitment) among secondary school students in Akwa Ibom State, Nigeria. Correlational research design was used in the study. A total of 1,053 Senior Secondary School Two (SS2) students were selected from a population of 20,434 students in public secondary schools using multistage sampling techniques. The “Soft Skills and Academic Resilience Questionnaire” (SSARQ) was used for data collection. The instrument was validated by three experts, and it yielded a reliability coefficient of .79 using the Cronbach Alpha Method. Canonical correlation analysis was used to test the hypothesis at the .05 level of significance. Finding of the study revealed that there is a significant relationship between the components of soft skills and the components of academic resilience among secondary school students, and common variance shared between data sets was found to be (28%). Based on these finding, it was recommended among others that schools should organized periodic workshops and training sessions for teachers and counsellors on how to recognize, cultivate, and assess soft skills among students.

Keywords: Communication Skill, Problem-Solving Skill, Critical Thinking, Time Management, Academic Resilience.