Assessment of Soft Skills Acquired by University Accounting Education Students for Employability in Rivers State.

Abstract

The study assessed soft skills acquired by Accounting Education students for employability in Rivers State. Three specific objectives, research questions and hypotheses were posed to guide the study. The research adopted a descriptive survey research design. The population of the study comprised one hundred and forty-five (145) third-year and fourth-year Accounting Education students of the 2024/2025 academic session in Rivers State University (RSU) and Ignatius Ajuru University of Education (IAUE). The entire population was studied due to its manageable size. The instrument for data collection was a structured questionnaire titled Assessment of Soft Skills Acquired by Accounting Education Students Questionnaire (ASSAAESQ), which was designed on a 4-point rating scale of (VHE=4, HE=3, ME=2 and LE=1) and was validated by three experts. Cronbach's alpha was used to determine the reliability of the instrument, which yielded a reliability coefficient of 0.84. 145 copies of the instrument were administered and duly retrieved after filling. Mean and standard deviation were used to answer the research questions, while t-test was used to test the hypotheses at 0.05 level of significance. The findings revealed that Accounting Education students in RSU and IAUE to a high extent acquired team-working skills, time-management skills and creative/innovative skills for employability in Rivers State. The conclusion drawn was that Accounting Education students acquired soft skills for employability. The researcher recommended that Accounting Education students should be exposed to collaborative workshops and seminars that will expose them more on soft skills acquisition.