Approaches

APPROACHES TO
EDUCATIONAL PLANNING

By
FAKOYA FOLAJIMI OLAMBO
127669

00

This paper attempts to explain three approaches to educational planning. The
approaches considered are: social demand approach; manpower requirement approach;
and cost benefit analysis. This paper went further to make an assessment of the strengths
and weaknesses of each approach.

INTRODUCTION
Educationalplanning is concerned with the problems of how to make the best use of
limited resources allocated to education in view of the priorities given to different stages
of education or different sector of education and the need of the economy.
According to Adesina (1982), there are three rival approaches to educational planning.
The three rival approaches are:
1. The social demand approach

-2. The manpower requirement approach
3. The cost benefit analysis

The Man-Power Requirement Approach
The focus of this approach is to forecast the manpower needs of the economy.
That is, it stresses output from the educational system to meet the man-power needs at
some future date. The approach focuses on 3 main elements, namely:
1.

Specification of the composition of manpower need atsome future date e.g.
2015-2020.

2.

Specification of man power availabilities e.g. in 1995.

3.

Specification which reconciles the former specification with the later.

Advantages of Man-Power Approach
1.

Man-Power could usefully call attention to extreme gaps and imbalances in the
education out-put pattern that need remedy. This does not need elaborate
statistical studies.2.

It gives educators useful guidance on how roughly educational qualifications of
the labour force ought to be developed in the future. That is, the relative

01

proportion of people who would have primary education, secondary education
and various amount of post-secondary training.
3.

The unemployment and underemployment which may result from some over emphasis on man-powerapproach may become a challenge to move towards the
right kind of education which may be development-oriented, and thereby creating
its own job.

Weaknesses of the Approach
1.
It gives educational planner a limited guidance in the sense that it does not tell
what can be actually achieved in every level of education e.g. primary education,
secondary education, etc.
2.

The approach says nothingabout primary education, which is not considered to be
work connected. By implication, manpower approach suggests the curbing of the
expansion of primary education until the nation is rich enough to expand it.
Hence, attention is focused on the cream of education that will contribute to
manpower development in the society.

3.

Most manpower needs are mostly needed in the urbanemployment. Thus, the
planner who may be called to plan is not given any useful clauses about education
requirements to those people like semi-skilled and unskilled workers in the cities
and vast majority of workers that live in rural areas.

4.

The employment classifications and manpower ratios such as desirable ratio of
engineers to technicians; doctors to nurses etc. and the assumed educationqualifications corresponding to each category of job borrowed ideas from
industrialized countries or economy. This does not fit into the realities of less
developed countries of Africa.

5.

It is impossible to make reliable fore-cast of manpower requirements far enough
ahead of time because of many economic, technological and other uncertainties
which are involved.

02

The SocialDemand Approach
This approach requires the education authorities to provide schools and find facilities for
all students who demand admission and who are qualified to enter. Aghenta (1987)
opined that this approach looks on education, as service demanded by people just like any
other social services. Politicians in developing countries often find the approach
expedient to use because of its...