Academic Planning Functions as Predictors of Goals Achievement in the Colleges of Education, Kwara State, Nigeria

Academic planning is an essential function of Higher Education Institutes (HEIs). The extent to which academic planning functions are performed determines to a large degree the attainment of the goals of HEIs in Nigeria. This research was conducted to examine if academic planning functions as a predictor of goal achievement in the Colleges of Education in Kwara State, Nigeria. Survey research method was used to establish the relationship between academic planning functions and goal achievement in/for the above mentioned colleges. A sample size of 421 out of 1,668 staff was determined using research advisors. The sample size of 421 participants comprised 147 academic staff and 274 non-teaching staff selected using a stratified and proportionate sampling technique. Two instruments were designed and used to collect the relevant data for this study. These instruments were Academic Planning Functions Questionnaire (APFQ) and Goals Achievement Questionnaire (GAQ). The data collected were analyzed using Smart PLS 3.1.4. The findings showed that program accreditation, information processing, and monitoring functions predicted goal achievement in the said colleges, while program initiation, internal quality assurance, resource projection, and financial planning functions did not predict goal achievement. Based on the findings, recommendations were made to improve the academic planning unit for increased efficiency, effectiveness, and productivity in these colleges.


Introduction
Academic planning in the tertiary education system plays a vital role in institutional development. Therefore, an Academic Planning Unit (APU) is concerned with the roles related to curricular development, quality assurance, information processing, and many others. Colleges of Education are referred to as higher learning institutions that involve the production of professional teachers' equipped with the skills and methodologies of teaching in our primary and junior secondary level of the education system in Nigeria (Ebisine, 2014). Academic planning in the colleges is carried out to enhance quality assurance in the institutions. According to researchers (Beerkens, 2018;Bosu & Amakyi, 2014) therefore referred to quality assurance as a systematic planning and review of an institution or program to ensure whether the minimum standards of education, scholarship, and infrastructure are being met, maintained, and improved in the system. Quality assurance in the higher education system concerns internal and external quality assurance systems (Haris, 2013;Seyfried & Pohlenz, 2018).
However, to pursue the course of academic planning in terms of the growth and development of higher education especially at Colleges of Education, there is always the need to engage the services of competent and experience personnel in the unit. These personnel will therefore be charged with responsibility of monitoring, coordinating and executing all academic plans of the institution in compliance with relevant standards and guidelines set by the National Commission for Colleges of Education (NCCE) in Nigeria. Furthermore, the APU is expected to plan and coordinates all strategies and programs that would enhance the realization of the mission and vision of the Colleges of Education. However, Colleges of Education play an important role in the production of teachers who stand as pillars for the entire education system and other workforce for all sectors of the nation especially the primary and junior secondary schools in our education system. Moreover, Colleges of education according to the mandate given by NCCE are to provide full-time training course in teaching and instruction, it also awards Nigeria Certificate in Education (NCE) to their students after attending a three years' mandatory course and satisfying all necessary requirements for the award of the certificate in compliance with the standards (Federal Republic of Nigeria, 2016).
To accomplish the common standards among the Colleges of Education, the Federal Government of Nigeria established the NCCE with the mandate of laying down minimum standards for all programs in the Colleges of Education in Nigeria, to accredit their certificates, newly introduced courses, and other academic awards (Federal Republic of Nigeria, 2012). However, despite the establishment of NCCE in Nigeria, most Colleges of Education are still faced with the problems of quality output. That is, students (trainees) who graduated from these institutions seem not to be able to demonstrate their competency. Longe (2017) argued that most departments in various Nigeria educational systems are not producing qualified graduate which indirectly have a negative effect on the economic, social and political development of the country. Atanda and Adewale (2020) argued that academic quality assurance demands that a suitable monitoring system be put in place in the Colleges of Education so that requisite data for judging quality can be UMT Education Review Volume 4 Issue 1, Spring 2021 obtained. This would have led to the creation of Academic Planning Units in many Colleges of Education to serve as an internal quality assurance monitoring unit (Akpan & Etor, 2016). Therefore, the achievement of the goals of Colleges of Education is based on efficiency and effectiveness with which the APU is able to discharge its statutory functions in compliance with the NCCE standards (Muhammad, 2020). These functions will be primarily based on accomplishing the institutional goals for production of highly motivated teachers, committed teachers, creative teachers, intellectually sound teachers, professional teachers and many others (Beerkens, 2018;Seyfried & Pohlenz, 2018).
In view of this, APU was established to monitor all the academic activities of Colleges of Education to ensure its efficient and effective performance in order to assist college administrators to accomplish the overall goals of Colleges of Education with the support of other sub-units. Megbo & Saka (2015) therefore opined that APU is to be proactive in its activities and take relevant and necessary initiative to meet the urgent needs of the institution and the public in general. The APU therefore must ensure that compliance with all activities of the institution, beginning from its vision, mission and strategic objectives, and ensuring all its operations cut across the areas of teaching, learning, research, community service, students admission and registration, academic programs, curricula contents, human and material resources, staff recruitment/deployment, and other related matters (Ndubuisi & Jacob, 2020;Oladosu, 2011). Academic Planning activities in Nigeria's higher education are becoming a very complex responsibility due to a variety of changes that are both internal and external to the academic institutions (Okolie et al., 2020). However, the work of academic planners contributes directly to the quality of the institutions. The academic planners are therefore referred to as internal experts that monitor and coordinate all academic activities for an institution's development.
Generally, Oladosu (2011) defined academic planning as the process of making suitable decisions for the realization of the objectives of an institution through the effective and efficient use of available resources. Most of the APU of institutions were established mainly for the purposes of coordinating the academic programs of the Colleges of Education and other institutions of higher learning in order to simplify their growth and development and to avoid unnecessary duplication of programs (Gray & Radloff, 2010;Alumode & Onuma, 2016).
Moreover, academic planning can basically be referred to as those activities, which are to be done by faculty/department staff in higher education to be able to perform their duties in a meaningful way to meet the objectives of the institution Department of Education Volume 4 Issue 1, Spring 2021 and personal growth (Iqbal & Asghar, 2020). In another development, the term academic planning could also be understood to include all major activities related to teaching, learning, research, and service in a higher educational institution. In a narrow sense, the term indicates key areas of activity that an academic has to follow when formulating or designing a course in a semester and managing its delivery.
It is quite understandable that even up till today people have not come to realize the level of responsibilities behind the success of APU in an institution. It must therefore be emphasized that institutions of higher learning are complex organizations that are composed of highly specialized sub-units, with each of them having different needs and challenges in ways special to them. It is therefore believed that a culture of thorough planning must be part of the structure of an institution, most especially in this current dynamic environment. Rowley and Sherman (2004) referred to academic planning as the heart and soul of the academic strategic plan. A strategic plan in an academic institution involves long term planning exercise based on the present and future need analysis of an institution (Mensah, 2020); the need analysis takes into account a number of areas including the students' needs, the market demands, while the strategic plan includes planning and management of a course, a program and a project in the higher education context (Babalola & Taiwo, 2016;Ndao, 2018). Academic planning can be long term and short-term planning; all gear towards achieving the goals of the colleges (Malik et al., 2011). However, the unit therefore guides and monitors the College's activities in a manner consistent with the stated goals and mission of the College and to also operate in such a way that will guarantee the achievement of high quality output of the College (Ebisine, 2014). Basically, Colleges of Education are to provide full-time course in teaching, instruction and training and to conduct courses in education for qualified teachers. Also, Colleges of Education are to produce highly qualified non-graduate professional teachers for the primary and junior secondary level of education in Nigeria (Barnes et al., 2019). For the goals of Colleges of Education to be achieved, certain mechanism must be put in place for realization of such goals and such mechanism should be a structured and coordinated unit to monitor all activities that will help in achieving such goals which is APU.
A goal is a desired result that a person or an organization plans and commit to achieve within certain period. In Colleges of Education, goal of a department can be described as a broad and general statements of what the program, course, activity intends to accomplish in a given department or institution as a whole. Goal can therefore be classified into long-term, short-term, and intermediate goal; and they UMT Education Review Volume 4 Issue 1, Spring 2021 are differentiated by the time frame involved in achieving those goals (Owens, 2017). Moreover, achievement is a result or outcome of some input and in this case, the educational input which will be committed into the system in the best interest of achieving the purpose for setting up the APU.
Muhammad (2020) advised if Colleges of Education in Nigeria want to achieve their goals, they must produce highly motivated, conscientious and efficient classroom teachers for primary and basic levels of our educational system, the administration of the Colleges of Education must ensure minimum standard is strictly complied with in their admission process, facilities, quality and quantity of staff. Failure to comply with these will hinder the attainment of college goals, thereby affecting the quality of the college output which is teacher produced. Therefore, academic planning in Colleges of Education should be a unit under the institution with the primary aim of achieving the institutional goals.
Based on the above discussion, several studies have been carried to address the current problem (Bichi, 2011;Megbo & Saka 2015;Megbo & Uadiale, 2015;Ndubuisi & Jacob, 2020). Paulley (2019) conducted a study on the roles of academic planning in the management of Nigerian universities system while Oladosu (2011) also carried out a study on accreditation in Nigerian Universities: the role of the academic planners. Megbo and Saka (2015) conducted their study on the roles of academic planning unit in the sustainability of university education. Also, Megbo and Uadiale (2015) conducted their study on examining the role of Academic Planners in the Development of Higher Education in Nigeria. None of the studies listed have really been conducted to examine the extent to which the academic planning functions relate with goals achievement in Colleges of Education in Kwara State.
The major focus of this study is centered on the view that the more the academic planning unit is able to perform its functions, all things been equal, will enhance the achievement of the goals of Colleges of Education in Kwara State. It is against this background that this study was carried out to examine academic planning functions as a predictor of goal achievement in Colleges of Education. Keeping in view the studies discussed above, following conceptual framework is suggested to undertake this study. Figure 1 depicts the conceptual framework of the study. It describes the relationship between academic planning functions and goals achievement. It is clearly showed from the model that the academic planning functions which is the input include among others; accreditation of programmes, information processing, Department of Education Volume 4 Issue 1, Spring 2021 and monitoring of College activities to ensure compliance with the NCCE standards in order to facilitate goals achievement which is the output.

Conceptual Model on Academic Planning Functions and Goals Achievement Academic Planning Process
The model indicates that academic planning functions are connected with achieving the institutional goals through the production of highly motivated and efficient classroom teachers.
Moreover, whether the goals of the colleges are achieved or not will serve as the feedback to the entire system and the process shall repeat itself.

Objectives of the Study
The objectives of this research were to examine:

Research Hypotheses
Based on the problems identified earlier in this study, the following hypotheses were formulated.

Research Methods
The current study was a descriptive survey of correlation type. This study design was used to examine the relationship between academic planning functions and goals achievement in the Colleges of Education in Kwara State, Nigeria. The population of the study comprised all the 2,155 staff members of the eight Colleges of Education in Kwara State, while the target population comprised 1668 staff members spread across five colleges. A sample size of 421 out of 1,668 staff members was determined using the research advisors (2006) 1 at 95.0% confidence level. The sample comprised147 academic staff and 274 non-academic staff selected using the stratified and proportionate sampling technique.
Two questionnaires were designed to gather the relevant data by the researcher. The first is the Academic Planning Functions Questionnaire (APFQ). It is a 39-item questionnaire consisting of seven sub-constructs measuring academic planning functions in the colleges. On the other hand, Goals Achievement Questionnaire (GAQ) was used to collect data on goal achievement. It is a 27-item scale consisting of six sub-constructs. The responses were based on a four-point Likert type scale ranging from 4-Strongly Agree (SA), 3-Agree (A), 2-Disagree (D) to 1-Strongly Disagree (SD). In order to determine the validity of the questionnaires, convergent validity which is a sub-type of construct validity was measured using an Average Variance Extracted (AVE) test. For convergent validity, the calculated value of the AVE must be greater than .50 (Fornell & Larcker (1981). Indeed, all AVE values for the items of APFQ and GAC were above the acceptable level. In the same vein, the reliability of the two instruments was also determined. Cronbach's alpha was used to determine the stability of the instruments in measuring the responses. It is a common statistical method used to measure the reliability and internal consistency of various scales (Cronbach, 1970). Hair et al. (2006) stated that the reliability of any scale is accepted if the Cronbach's alpha value for each one of the constructed items is equal or greater than .70. The reliability coefficients of this study showed a high degree of internal consistency as the values of Cronbach's alpha ranged from .811 to .921 for both APFQ and GAQ. Also, the reliability coefficient values ranged from .835 to .947. Moreover, Falk and Miller (1992) suggested that the standardized path loadings for all indicators of any research must be 0.50 and above; if this value is attained, such indicators are referred to as being significant. For this study, all path loadings were found to be significant.
The research questions raised in this study were answered using the descriptive method of calculating mean and standard deviation carried out with the aid of SPSS (version 21). Furthermore, the hypotheses formulated were analyzed using Partial Least Square Structural Equation Modelling (PLS-SEM) implemented with Smart Pls 3.1.4. All the hypotheses were tested at0.05 level of significance.

Demographic Profile of the Respondents
The demographic profile of the respondents (as shown in Table 1) was analyzed by the researcher using their demographic characteristics in terms of the types of college, position, highest academic qualification, and experience. Of all the 421 respondents, 294 (69.8%) served in state colleges of education, 95 (22.6%) served in private colleges of education and 31 (7.4%) served in federal colleges of education.
As revealed in the descriptive analysis, the highest number of respondents 69 (22.6%) were lecturers I followed by 62 (20.3%) who are lecturer 241 (57.2%) and the respondents cut across academic staff planning unit, HODs, registrars, admission officers, course coordinators, deans of schools and establishment officers. The summary is presented in (25.2%) had between 6 and 10 years of work experience and only 32 (7.6%) respondents were new entrants into the system. As such, the respondents cut across different levels of work experience.

Descriptive Analysis of Research Variables
Descriptive statistics for all latent variables in this study were computed through mean and standard deviation. A four-point Likert type response scale with strongly disagree (1) at the one end and strongly agree (4) at the other end was used to measure the indicators for all the latent variables of this study. The results are presented in tables 2 and 3 below; for easier interpretation, the responses to the four-point Likert scale were categorized into three types namely 1.00-2.00 as low,2.01 -3.00 as moderate and 3.01 -4.00 as high.
Research Objective One: What is the level of performance of academic planning functions in the Colleges of Education in Kwara State, Nigeria?
As shown in Table 2, the mean values of all the seven dimensions of academic planning functions are between 3.02 and 3.22, while the academic planning functions construct itself has a mean value of 3.15. This means that the respondents tended to show a moderate level of performance regarding academic planning functions in the various Colleges of Education. To determine the level of goals achievement in the Colleges of Education, the mean and standard deviation of the six measures of goals achievement were determined. As shown in Table 3, all the six measures of goals achievement have mean values ranging from 3.26 to 3.37 and the composite mean value for goals achievement construct is 3.32. Therefore, using the threshold value of mean value UMT Education Review Volume 4 Issue 1, Spring 2021 of 2.01-3.00, it was determined that the Colleges of Education in Kwara State have a moderate or medium level of goals achievement (See Table 3).

Hypotheses Testing
In order to achieve the objectives of the current study and explore the problem, one main hypothesis (Ho) and seven operational hypotheses (Ho1 to Ho7) were formulated. The results are presented in the tables and figures below.  As shown in Figure 1 and Table 3, the results of the analysis revealed that academic planning functions have a positive and significant relationship with goals achievement in the Colleges of Education in Kwara State (β = 0.557, t =15.307 p<0.005). Thus, the hypothesis is rejected and it implies that 100% enhancement of academic planning functions brings about 38.2% improvement in the goals achievement level of the Colleges of Education in Kwara State, Nigeria.

H ο 1: There is no significant relationship between the program initiation function and goals achievement in the Colleges of Education in Kwara State, Nigeria.
The results depicted in Table 3 revealed that program initiation does not have a significant relationship with goals achievement in the Colleges of Education. Thus, the null hypothesis is accepted (β= 0.067, t=1.615, p>0.05).

H ο 2: There is no significant relationship between internal quality assurance function and goals achievement in the Colleges of Education in Kwara State, Nigeria.
As depicted in Table 3, the findings revealed that internal quality assurance has no significant relationship with goals achievement in the Colleges of Education. Thus, the null hypothesis is accepted (β= 0.016, t=0.242, p>0.05).

H ο 3: There is no significant relationship between resource projection needs and goals achievement in the Colleges of Education in Kwara State, Nigeria.
The results depicted in Table 3 revealed that resource projection functions have no significant relationship with goals achievement in the Colleges of Education. Thus, the null hypothesis is accepted (β= 0.015, t=0.277, p>0.05).

H ο 4: There is no significant relationship between program accreditation and goals achievement in the Colleges of Education in Kwara State, Nigeria.
The results presented in Table 3 revealed that program accreditation has a positive and significant relationship with goals achievement in the Colleges of Education. Thus, the null hypothesis is rejected (β= 0.237, t=3.887, p<0.05). It implies that 100% improvement in program accreditationbrings about 23.7% improvements in goals achievement in the Colleges of Education.

H ο 5: There is no significant relationship between the information processing function and goals achievement in the Colleges of Education in Kwara State, Nigeria.
The results depicted in Table 3 showed that information processing has a positive and significant relationship with goals achievement in the Colleges of UMT Education Review Volume 4 Issue 1, Spring 2021 Education. Thus, the null hypothesis is rejected (β= 0.185, t=3.200, p<0.05). It implies that 100% improvement in information processing brings about 18.5% improvements in goals achievement in the Colleges of Education.
H ο 6: There is no significant relationship between financial planning and goals achievement in the Colleges of Education in Kwara State, Nigera.
The results presented in Table 3 revealed that financial planning has no significant relationship with goals achievement in the Colleges of Education. Thus, the null hypothesis is accepted (β= 0.023, t=0.361, p>0.05).

H ο 7: There is no significant relationship between the monitoring of college activities and goals achievement in the Colleges of Education in Kwara State, Nigeria.
As presented in Table 3, the results revealed that the monitoring of college activities has a positive and significant relationship with goals achievement in the Colleges of Education. Thus, the null hypothesis is rejected (β= 0.178, t=3.065, p<0.05). It implies that 100% improvement in the monitoring of college activities brings about 17.8% improvements in their level of goals achievement (See Figure  3).

Discussion
The results showed that the academic planning functions enhanced goals achievement in the Colleges of Education in Kwara State, Nigeria. It was further revealed that 100% enhancement in academic planning brings about 38.2% improvement in goals achievement. It is sufficed to say here that accreditation, information processing and monitoring functions enhance the goals achievement of the colleges. Therefore, 38.2% of goals achievement is a result of effective program accreditation, improved information processing and proper monitoring of the activities of the Colleges of Education. However, inefficient and ineffective handling of program initiation, quality assurance, resource projection and financial planning function of the Colleges of Education has translated into the nonsignificance of these constructs, resulting into 61.8% decrease in goals achievement.

UMT Education Review
Volume 4 Issue 1, Spring 2021 The study revealed that there was no significant relationship between program initiation and goals achievement in the Colleges of Education in Kwara State. It implies that the program initiation function of academic planning does not have any positive impact on goals achievement in these colleges. This finding further revealed that the APU in the Colleges of Education does not fully partake in the initiation of new program(s). However, new programs are meant to be developed according to the needs of the colleges and the society. This might be due to the transfer of this function from the APU, which prevents the unit to fully carry out this function.
It was also revealed that there was no significant relationship between the internal quality assurance function and goals achievement in the Colleges of Education in Kwara State. It shows that the internal quality assurance function does not have a significant effect on goals achievement. Hence, it is inferred that the component of quality assurance that includes staffing, academic contents, physical facilities and library facilities (e-library inclusive) are not properly monitored and supervised. Therefore, the level of internal quality assurance put in place in the Colleges of Education by the APU is not effective and does not have a significant effect on goals achievement in these colleges. The quality of available staff, lecture rooms, and library facilities in these colleges do not indicate effective internal monitoring on the part of APU. It implies that the internal quality assurance measure put in place by the APU was not effective enough to influence goals achievement. Inadequate provision of lecture rooms to cater for the teeming population of students in these colleges as well as the inadequate provision of modern library such as the e-library, which is one of the pre-requisites used to measure the quality of a college as regulated by NCCE, may have led to this finding. However, the achievement of quality and standard higher education entails the systematic appraisal of the curriculum in line with the needs of the students, industry and the society (Asiyai, 2020).
Furthermore, the findings showed that there was no significant relationship between resource projection function and goals achievement in the Colleges of Education in Kwara State. It implies that the resource projection function of the APU does not contribute positively to goals achievement in these colleges. The outcome of the resource projection function includes the projection of staff requirements and students' needs. In view of this finding, it is inferred that the academic planning function in relation to the projection of the available resources in these colleges is not properly carried out to influence their overall goals achievement. It is further inferred that there is either over-staffing or Department of Education Volume 4 Issue 1, Spring 2021 overpopulation of students in these colleges. Therefore, the academic planning function in this area is not effective to accomplish the college goals.
The current study further revealed that there was a significant relationship between the program accreditation function and goals achievement in the Colleges of Education in Kwara State. It shows that the program accreditation function of academic planning has a significant effect on goals achievement in these colleges. It, therefore, implies that the effective discharge of the academic planning function on program accreditation will further enhance institutional goals achievement. This stance is supported by the study of Akomolafe and Ibijola (2014), which revealed that there is a significant relationship between the program accreditation function and resource input in Nigerian universities. The study further revealed that the program accreditation function of APU and the quality assurance measure should be strengthened in order to accomplish the institutional goals. Moreover, the finding of this study is in conformity with that of Akomolafe and Ibijola (2014) which showed that there is significant relationship between the accreditation of academic programs and quality of university education in South West Nigeria. It implies that academic planning in university education in South West Nigeria is properly carried out to ensure that all programs of the universities have full accreditation status in order to comply with the standard set by National Universities Commission (NUC).
The outcome of the current study showed that there was a significant relationship between the information processing function and goals achievement in the Colleges of Education in Kwara State. According to Adeleye (2016), for an institutional goal to be achieved the process of monitoring, coordinating and controlling of programs should be based on the effectiveness of the APU as regards information processing. It involves the ability to gather process and keep data for easy retrieval by the users within and outside the institutional environment. The effectiveness of APU regarding information processing depends very much on how well it can monitor, coordinate and control the flow of available information (Isah, 2017). This is effectively carried out in the Colleges of Education and it may have led to the achievement of their goals.
The findings further showed that there was no significant relationship between the financial planning function and goals achievement in the Colleges of Education in Kwara State. It shows that the financial planning function of the APU does not have a positive correlation with goals achievement. The components of financial planning entail budget preparation, monitoring, compliance and strict implementation of the approved budget. In view of this fact, the APU may not be able to effectively carry out this function because of the overlapping authority of UMT Education Review Volume 4 Issue 1, Spring 2021 the audit unit/external auditor of the institution in this regard. The audit unit of an institution is mandated to prepare, monitor and ensure strict compliance with the approved budget. This may render the APU ineffective as outlined by (Longe, 2017).
The findings also revealed that there was a significant relationship between the monitoring of college activities function and goals achievement in the Colleges of Education in Kwara State. It shows that the monitoring of college activities function of APU has a positive effect on goals achievement as recommended by Asiyayi (2020). The activities of the Colleges of Education monitored by the APU include among others the level of compliance with the college admission guidelines as stipulated by NCCE. This finding conforms to that of Israel and Israel (2014) based on their study on admission guidelines in the Colleges of Education in South East Nigeria. It is, therefore, inferred that the academic planning function of the monitoring of college activities is strictly performed and monitored in accordance with the NCCE and JAMB/UTME admission guidelines and standards as confirmed by (Muhammad, 2020). The study found that one of the aims of the academic planning functions in the Colleges of Education is to ensure strict compliance with the stipulated admission guidelines through its monitoring function to enhance the quality of the academic process in these colleges, which eventually helps them to achieve the goals for which they were established as recommended by (Iqbal & Asghar, 2020). This is also in line with Kayode et al. (2018), who recommended that the quality of academic process is crucial for a university to achieve its goals. Therefore, the monitoring of college activities function of APU has a significant relationship with goals achievement in the Colleges of Education in Kwara State.

Conclusions
The findings of this study established that academic planning functions have a positive and significant relationship with goals achievement. It implies that, in order to achieve institutional goals in the Colleges of Education in Kwara State, academic planning functions must be carried out effectively in the areas of program initiation, resource projection, internal quality assurance, program accreditation, information processing, financial planning and the monitoring of college activities. Only then, an effective discharge of academic planning functions would lead to goals achievement in the Colleges of Education in Kwara State, Nigeria.

Department of Education
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Recommendations
Based on the findings and conclusion reached in this study, the following recommendations are made: 1. The APU in the Colleges of Education in Kwara State should improve its internal quality assurance function in the areas of the provision of e-library facility and the provision of more classrooms/lecture rooms to accommodate the teeming student population in order to comply with the NCCE benchmark on the lecturer-student ratio. 2. The management of the Colleges of Education in Kwara State should ensure that all accredited programs/courses must continue to meet the accreditation standards set by the NCCE and must continue to align with the current needs of the society. 3. APU should ensure that all the newly initiated programs in the Colleges of Education meet the accreditation standards and requirements within the stipulated timeframe before the arrival of the NCCE accreditation team. 4. The monitoring function of the APU must be centered on all departments/units in the colleges to ensure their compliance with the NCCE guidelines and standards, most especially regarding admission requirements for the prospective students. 5. Colleges of Education should improve in the program initiation function in order to enhance its positive impact on their goals achievement. 6. The resource needs of the colleges must be properly projected by the APU in an effort to ensure its effectiveness and efficiency through proper and upto-date record keeping.