Effect of Basic Education Policy on Rural Development in Ekiti State, Nigeria

The study examined the effect of basic education policy on rural development in the study area; and analysed the challenges confronting basic education policy implementation for rural development in the State. These were with a view to providing information on the effect of basic education policy on rural development of Ekiti State. The study adopted survey research design. Primary and secondary data were utilised for the study. Primary data were collected through the administration of questionnaire and interview. The distribution of the sample size is as follow: 93 teachers, 34 members of Local Government Departments of Education and 89 members of Community Development Association. In addition, interview was conducted on six purposively selected respondents, which comprised Local Inspectors of Education in the selected local governments. Secondary data was obtained from books, journal articles, internet, annual reports, workshops, conferences and seminar papers, newspapers and policy documents relating to the subject matter. Data collected was analysed using appropriate descriptive statistics. The descriptive statistics included the use of frequency distribution, percentages and measure of central tendency (mean). The study revealed that reduction in poverty level, economic growth and development, and equal accessibility to basic education were some of the effect of basic education policy on rural development in Ekiti State. The study reported that basic education policy has significant effect on rural development in Ekiti State (r = +0.685, p < 0.05)