DOI: https://doi.org/10.36347/sjahss.2024.v12i12.004

Pages: 381-388

1. This study was designed to determine the skill needs of technical college students for effective processing of timber for building construction in Rivers State. This study was necessitated in response to the prevailing issue of deterioration of timber members in building construction. Three specific purposes of the study with three corresponding research questions and three null hypotheses were formulated to guide the study. A survey research designed was used for the study. The population was 81 which include 66 timber processors and 15 building teachers in technical in the colleges. The instrument used for data collection was questionnaire which contains 27 skilled items. The 27 items questionnaire was structured on four point rating scale of strongly agree (AS) = 4, Agree (A) = 3, disagree (D) = 2 and strongly disagree (SD) = 1. Reliability was determined using cronbach Alpa and the result yielded a reliability coefficient of 0.89. Eighty one copies of the questionnaire were distributed, correctly completed and returned within three days. This accounts for100 percent return rate. The instrument which was used to elicit responses from the respondents was validated by an expert from Enugu State University of science and technology, Department of Technology and Vocational Education and two other exparts from Rivers State University, in the department of Technical and Vocational Education. The research questions were analyzed using mean with standard deviation. Any mean score of 2.50 and above were regarded as agree while items with mean below 2.50 were regarded as disagree. The null hypotheses were tested at .05 level of significance using t-test. The findings of the study showed that technical college students must acquire conversion skills such as ability to read out figures on measuring tapes, seasoning skill such as ability to remove back and preservative skills such as ability to handle chemical, if they must go into timber processing. Based on the findin