Youth, Parental-determined Strategy towards Tackling Perennial Unemployment in Nigeria as Device for a Safe Future

This study focuses on the youth and the parent fighting future unemployment through present combination of apprenticeship with studentship. A phenomenon of which little is known, conducted in 4 selected secondary schools in Ondo state, Nigeria. Data through a multistage sampling technique, from 160 students’ terminal mean scores of third and first terminal results of 2016/2017 and 2017/2018 sessions respectively, were analyzed. Results showed that consideration of the possibility of future unemployment has significant relationship with students’ combination of apprenticeship with academics [r (158) = 0.211, p < .05] among others. Although parents seek to play safe regarding future employment opportunity for their children, differences in mean scores in academic performance indicate that those who did not combine studentship with apprenticeship (M=515.75; SD=171.58) outperformed those who did (M=513.52; SD=146.24). Similarly, combined activities have a direct relationship with stress capable of affecting physical and mental life of students thus casting doubt on the future safety net of the decision.


INTRODUCTION
Necessity is the mother of invention which appeared in the dialogue, Republic, a saying credited to the ancient Greek philosopher, Plato, informs the moves by individuals and indeed parents, to strive to prepare the youths for future role as employers of labour or at least secure a seat for self-reliance. The precarious situation of employment in the country has reached an alarming stage that seems to defy all speculations even by politicians who will usually catch in on such situations to assure the electorate of harvest of jobs once voted into political office. The national youth policy in Nigeria has defined the Nigerian youth to include ages between 15 and 34 years [1]. According to the National Population Commission [2], half or 50% of the estimated 167 million Nigerian population were said to be youth who fall within the age category of 15-34 years.
The national youth policy [1] has defined the age range of youth to exclude young people below age 15 years; however, for the purpose of this study, youth of the secondary school ages of between 12 and 14 years, especially those in their early teens, are also included as youth. Based on the above, the youth in this study includes young teens of secondary school ages and older who engage in part-time trade learning while still in schools, forms the focus of this study. In 2012, about 11.1 million youth (15)(16)(17)(18)(19)(20)(21)(22)(23)(24)(25)(26)(27)(28)(29)(30)(31)(32)(33)(34) years) were unemployed [3]. And this trend has persisted as several factors such as structural, cyclical and technological causes of unemployment have not been adequately addressed [3]. For example, while the Nigerian general unemployment rate stood at 18.8% in 2018 from 14.2% in 2017 [4], youth unemployment rate in Nigeria decreased to 36.50 percent in the third quarter of 2018 from 38 percent in the second quarter of 2018.Despite the decrease, it is still an all-time high if compared with other countries' rates. However, the ILO claimed 23.10 percent in the third quarter of 2019 [5].
High rate of unemployment is not peculiar to Nigeria. Countries with high per capital incomes such as Spain, Italy and France have sometimes recorded an all-time high youth unemployment indices as, 30.6 percent, 29.3 percent and 19.9 percent respectively in 2019 [6]. However, concerted efforts are often geared towards ameliorating the situation in such places, such that palpable fear of future unemployment of youth and this type of emerging 'parental-youth strategy' seem unnecessary. The current unemployment situation in Nigeria propels parents to think about the future of their youth especially as such parents still continue to shoulder life responsibilities of their youth even after graduating from tertiary institutions. Even the over-aged graduating student is forced to enlist for the mandatory NYSC programme in hope of securing employment after the service year. When children are gainfully employed, it is believed that it serves as future life endowment to parents thereby guaranteeing a safe future.
Under normal circumstances, young people who are part of the youth are expected to be in schools. Schooling, apart from ensuring manpower development in any nation, is a means to a crucial end which is economic empowerment, a goal, trade learning while still in schools, also seeks to achieve. Will it not be viewed as a role conflict situation when combined with apprenticeship at the same time? Through parental advice, some youth are encouraged to engage in some forms of tradelearning or apprenticeship after the school hours instead of working on their studies. Empirical evidence has revealed that while girls engage in learning skill such as cloth weaving, cloth dyeing, hair weaving/beauty salons, garment making, boys take after garment making, barbing, auto mechanics, carpentry, electronics repairs, phone repairs, shopkeeping and other apprenticeship trainings after school hours.
Given the state of unemployment in the country, it is not out of place to seek expansion of opportunity for future employment through combining studentship and learning a trade. However, this strategy presents the dilemma given the interface of problems and challenges that could undermine the overall performance of the students involved. This is because the two spheres of education are in regular /formal as well as part-time/non-formal spheres and bother on role conflict. This situation had been observed by K. R Merton [7] as presenting problems for the individuals concerned because already a single status such as studentship has a complex roleset, attached to it let alone adding that of the informal trade-learning as an apprentice. Since the two spheres represent multiple statuses, their combination is likely to present problems that might affect concentration of the student concerned. One fact is that the attention of the particular student is split between two activities at the same time; and as such, to what extent could they be combined to ensure success? Would not laudable goal of formal education be vitiated by zeal to achieve a safe future for the youth?
Other questions that may engage the mind include: To what extent could this arrangement ensure a safe future for the youth when education which is also a means to an end is likely to suffer in the long run? Is there any significant relationship between the consideration of unemployment situation in the country and students' participation in after-school apprenticeship or part-time tradelearning arrangement? Is there any significant relationship between students' participation in combined academic/vocational activities and optimal academic performance? Is there any significant relationship between students' participation in such combined activities and challenges posed by stress risk on their health-life?
Given the above, the study seeks to realize the following objectives: i.
To identify if students participate in vocational training as a means to tackle unemployment in the future. ii.
To investigate if there are academic challenges students combining academics and apprenticeship could face. iii.
To examine if there are any health risks/challenges such combined activities could pose to students.

REVIEW OF RELEVANT LITERATURE
Prior to colonialism, apprenticeship had been practiced as a means of occupational training in Nigeria [8]. In general, apprenticeship is a contractual agreement whereby the mastercraftsman agrees to undertake the training of a leaner for an agreed period. Sometimes, the contract involved payment of some charge or it may not, depending upon the nature of relationship between parties involved or the community concerned. In the sub-Saharan Africa, apprenticeships are known as the commonest form of "non-academic training and leads to self-employment rather than to wage jobs" [9].
In the past, it was common in those days to see young people receiving training under a mastercraftsman in areas such as trades and crafts, farming, fishing, hunting, carving, carpentry, sculpting, painting, building, decorating, gold or silver smiting, catering, boat-making, matmaking, dyeing, petty poultry and animal husbandry. In Nigeria as in most parts of Africa, the process was guided by tradition and custom and in most cases was lineage-based under a master-learner contract agreement [10] (Uwameiye, Raymond and Iyamu).
Every lineage was identified with a particular craft to which family members were socialized on the basis of their sex. Upon colonialism, the traditional craft/tradelearning was expanded to include training in other areas such as automobile, electrical repairs, metal work, and so on (Uwameiyeand Iyamu [10]. Learning took place under informal arrangement and content of training was under the exclusive dictate of the master-craftsman [10]. At expiration of the period agreed upon, if both parents and the craftmaster are satisfied that the skill has been passed, then a period of 'freedom' is declared with an elaborate ceremony, thus signaling the end of the training. In our modern time, the ceremony culminates in the issuance of certificate of completion by the master with extensive prayers in the audience of the parents and well-wishers. It is after such ceremony that the trainee is believed to be capable enough to also act as master-craftsman to others. This type of apprenticeship agreement and training was common in the southwest and Midwest Nigeria, particularly among the Yoruba and Edo peoples.
In eastern Nigeria particularly among the Igbo, the customary apprenticeship contract model differs and occurs in two ways [8]. The first is where the apprentice lives and trains under the supervision of the master-craftsman for an agreed period. The apprentice is viewed as a servant who learns a particular trade under a crafts-master, mostly between 3-7 years. In comparison to the southwest, this kind of apprenticeship did not attract any charge for the training. According to Okene [11], this is referred to as Igba odibo. In addition to staying with the master, his feeding and other necessities of life are also provided; while the servant in turn, serves and obeys his instructions [11,8]. Under this arrangement as in others as well, masters sometimes adopt what may be called momentary servanthood retainership, a practice whereby servants continue to work as journeymen for a while under their masters until they are 'settled' in order to be on their own. The second form is similar to what obtains under the southwest model of apprenticeship which attracts payment of lump sum to the crafts-master but the trainee does not live with the craft-master. This among the Igbo is called imuoru aka [8].
According to Olulu and Udeorah [8], apprenticeship, until recently in Nigeria, was engaged by those who due to deficiency in academic ability could not go beyond either primary or secondary schools. This is especially so for youths who could not progress for the Senior Secondary School (SSS) programme. Apprenticeship training has also been significant for those youth who are still waiting to make appreciable score in their Post-UTME examinations for tertiary education admission. However, not only those who have deficiency in academic pursuit, but also those who by virtue of tradition and in keeping with personal choice deliberately, opt for a vocation which they think would guarantee good future for them [9]. Similarly, there are undergraduates who opt for apprenticeship in areas such as tailoring, sewing, barbing saloon and phone repairs and so on, around their campuses in order to earn a living instead of waiting endlessly for 'gainful' employment after graduation. Even within the mandatory one-year National Youth Service Corps (NYSC), some graduate apprentices complete their tradelearning which they combine with trades learnt during their ENT (entrepreneurial) classes while on campus. This does not only boost the entrepreneurial spirit in such graduates but ameliorate the problems associated with graduate unemployment.
Olulu and Udeorah [8] further argued that increase in the annual turnout of secondary as well as higher institution graduates in the country without hope of being absorbed by the labour market has widen the scope of patronage of apprenticeship in the country [12]. The full expression of the above types of apprenticeship (both southwest and southeast models) of apprenticeship contracts could not be accommodated under the current study because the 'trainees' involved are still in school. While the southeast full-time apprenticeship contract is completely excluded from the current study, the remainder could only serve for part-time apprenticeship arrangement which provides some latitude for combination of apprenticeship with studentship. The ensuing conflict between the two spheres of training may act as barrier to concentration, commitment and good health of the youth concerned [13].
Science Daily [14] published a study conducted at The Ohio State University in 2019. The study looked at effects of multitasking on adolescents.
Those studied reported feeling more negative emotions at a later activity, as they find such activity (e.g homework) more difficult or tiring. Furthermore, the study found that when participants find positive emotions at initial task, the less positive they tended to be in subsequent activities. In a similar vein, another study published by Science Daily [15], a nationwide survey of 21,678 US high school students were asked about how they typically feel about high school. The answers received by the researchers from the Yale Center for Emotional Intelligence and the Yale Child Study Center indicated that nearly 75% of the students' self-reported feelings which related to schools were negative -"tired," closely followed by "stressed" and "bored." If schooling alone could be so perceived as stressful by the students, it then suggests that situation of things might be more difficult (resulting in role conflict situation) if youths combine apprenticeship with studentship. Youths who engage in this kind of combination do so in agreement with their parents as mark of obedience to them on the understanding that their parents would know more than they do. In addition, it is common for the students even right in their families to see examples of jobless youths all around. So, the questions of whether the students as teenagers would be rebellious or disobedient would hardly arise.
Studies have highlighted the huge benefits of the apprenticeship practices to the individual, the economy and society. For example, Olulu and Udeorah [8] noted that apprenticeship training could rid the environment of miscreants and breeding space for full-blown criminal activities as 'idle hands' could become 'the devil's workshop'. It has contributed to the economy as those trained under informal sector of the economy provide services to meet industrial needs [9]. Obi and Agha [16] argued that an apprenticeship practice is a means of creating new businesses, which in turn provides avenues for the creation of new jobs. Apart from expanding the development of the informal sector and aiding traditional skill transfer across generations, it creates opportunities for youths to acquire skills and become self-reliant thereby limiting the queue in the employment market [9]. It also acts as an ameliorative strategy to combat poverty [16].
Both apprenticeship types have their problems which in most cases bother on dishonesty on the part of the master-craftsman and the apprentice as well. On the full-time apprenticeship, there are cases when the master plays pranks and refuses to 'settle' the servant and let him leave. On the other hand, the servant could be dishonest engaging in pilfering and 'saving' money for raining days without the knowledge of the master. In addition, for some reasons, there are times the wife of the master could appear too difficult to please in terms of availability of the servant for household chores. The part-time apprentice has little or no time for such practices as he neither stays with the master nor experiencemuch interaction with the wife of the master. After training, employment rewards to apprenticeship training can be lower than rewards from higher levels of academic training [9].
In sum, while apprenticeship is common practice among us, the combination of apprenticeship with academic study simultaneously, is, yet, a phenomenon of which little is known.

ROLE CONFLICT AND RATIONAL CHOICE THEORIES
Talcott Parsons, Ralf Dahrendorf, and Erving Goffman are chief exponents of role theory in sociology [17]. Through his work on social systems, Parsons [18] asserted that enduring patterns of behaviours were thought to persist within social systems because they actualize certain functions that individuals perform -roles they play. The patterned behaviour is made possible through shared expectations from the behaviour of others (roles). To him, social life is made possible when every person fulfills his or her role towards expectation of others. Dahrendorf [19] on his own part submits that "conflict is a basic fact of social life and that class conflict could have beneficial consequences for society, such as progressive change". Similarly, Goffman [20], through his theory called dramaturgy asserts that social life resembles theatrical performance whereby every actor projects how he wishes to be perceived by people [17].
Role refers to a set of duties, expectations, norms and behaviour that an individual is saddled with by virtue of his status. The status that an individual occupies in society reflects his position in the social structure [21]. The social structure determines how individuals are expected to behave in specific social contexts vis-à-vis the status they occupy. In role theory, when a set of multiple roles an individual has to fulfill carry contradictory expectations, role conflict occurs. Role conflict happens due to the presence of conflict of interest as a result of multiple statuses individuals occupy and several expectations attached to each of them. Roles then become conflictual when several roles jostle for limited time thereby causing dilemma or difficulty to their performance.
The youth who is still in school desires a good academic grade but that is not going to come by easily. He has to study, attend classes (student role), prepare for examinations and also participates in all activities at school. If he is occupied in any other engagement (nonacademic), his multiple statuses (student/ apprentice) thus hamper his effective performance as student. In addition, the role conflict theory in relation to this study could provide an explanation to some health and academic challenges which might be experienced by students who engage in part-time apprenticeship training. The student plays the roles of both student and apprentice together. During the early hours of the day, he functions as a student and as an apprentice at evening hours. Ideally, the evening hours are supposed to be a period of rest and revision of academic notes and lessons learnt earlier in the day at school. Eventually, inadequate rest and non-revision of school work could lead to a decline in the health of the student and academic performance respectively; as he struggles to cope with the requirements of the two roles he has been saddled with. Additional theoretical explanation could be offered through rational choice theory.
Rational choice theory was developed by the sociologist, George Homans, who in [22] laid the basic framework for exchange theory. According to this theory, individuals are motivated by their personal wants and goals including personal desires. As individuals cannot fulfill all the various things they want at once, they must make their choice within the spectrum of both their goals and the means for attaining them. This theory could be an explanation for combining academics with part-time apprenticeship. The student who engages in such combined activities chooses to see only the benefits of apprenticeship such as gaining a specific skill and becoming self-employed especially as employment space gets slimmer and slimmer by day. The determinant of his choice could be the fear of looming unemployment, even after acquiring the relevant academic certificates. It could not be argued that such a student is forced by his parent. It must have been a youth, parental-determined decision; more especially, as the student is aware and motivated by the effects of unemployment on those who had attended tertiary education before him.

METHODS
We selected 160 students through multi-stage sampling technique from 4 secondary schools in Akungba and Ikare communities of Ondo State, Nigeria. The two communities selected are semiurban communities which cannot be compared with the state capital or some other sections of the state in terms of socioeconomic development. Youths in these are as have not been exposed to myriads of money-making ventures and are not that socially exposed to youthful exuberance found in citylife where disobedience and sophisticated thought life have tilted towards parental disobedience and rebellion. Furthermore, it is in this kind of areas one can find a preponderance of the phenomenon under investigation due to their level of sophistication and degree of distance to centers of development in the state. Moreover, the two areas were selected in order to increase the possibility of harnessing adequate population sample for the study. First, the schools were selected purposively, mainly from among public schools where empirical observation reveals the preponderant nature of the phenomenon. While the initiative might be suggested by the parent but choice of type of apprenticeship might be done by the youth. Public schools remain the most patronized by most lower/middle class households who are believed to be more futurefearful given their perspective of children as life endowment assurance for a safe future. Students in the participating schools are stratified into those learning trade and those not learning trades after the school hour, while systematic method was used to select the required number from among them. The schools are Community High School, Sopare junction, Akungba, AUD Secondary School and Oroke High school all in Akungba. The fourth secondary school is Lennon Jubilee High School located in Ikare. In the analyses, students who are combining studentship with studentship are treated as experimental group while those who do not are used as control group.
A 27-item, thoroughly simplified questionnaire was used to gather data from the students. Section A comprised 10 questions on personal information, 9 on future unemployment trade earning and schooling and 8 items on stressrelated issues. Stress was measured using Perceived Stress Scale (PSS) by Cohen [23].
Responses ranged from Never (0) through Almost Never (1), Sometimes (2), Fairly Often (3) to Very often (4). This has been validated in several studies across USA populations and beyond with around cronbach alpha of 0.79. An example of the question reads thus: In the last month, how often have you been upset (troubled) because of something that happened unexpectedly (without you expecting it)? Descriptive statistics, Pearson's Product Moment Correlation (PPMC) and Independent t-test were used to test the hypotheses set for the study. Furthermore, the raw terminal scores of the students from the 4 schools for the 3 rd term, 2016/2017 academic session and 1 st term, 2017/2018 academic session, were collected, added and divided by 2, in order to determine the overall academic performance of each student.
While students' academic performance constituted the dependent variable in the analyses, combination of studentship and apprenticeship constituted the independent variable.

ANALYSES AND RESULTS
In Table 1, analyses of personal social characteristics of the respondents are presented.
Personal information reveals that 62.5% of the respondents are male, while 37.5% are female; 1.3% are within the age group of 8 and 10 years, 14.4% fall between 11 and 13 years, 50% between 14 and 16 years, 32.5% between 17 and 19 years, while 1.9% fall within the age group of 20 and 22 years. This distribution implies that most of the sampled students are within age categories of 14 to 16 years. Furthermore, the distribution falls at the border line of between 15 and 34 years defined as youth-age category in Nigeria. On school affiliation, 5.6% of the students are from AUD Secondary School, 46.9% from Community High School, 20% from Oroke Secondary School (all located in Akungba community), while 27.5% are students from Lennon Jubilee High School, Ikare, Akoko. All the schools are situated in Ondo north senatorial district of Ondo State, Nigeria.
On class distribution, 9.4% are in JSS1, 25.6% in JSS2, 6.9% in JSS3, 13.8% are in SSS1, 32.5% are in SSS2, while 11.9% are SSS3 students. The modal group as may be observed is the SSS 2 class. On mode of students' involvement in part-time tradelearning, 45.6% are not into any form of apprenticeship training; 3.8% are into carpentry; 1.3% in plumbing; 11.3% in barbing or hair dressing; 1.9% are in phone repairs, 3.1% in trading (buying and selling, e.g. clothes); 23.8% train as fashion designers; 3.8% learn how to be good instrumentalists/computer expert; 1.9% are in bag or bead making; 1.3% engage in farming, 0.6% are into makeup/ art work, while 1.9% learn shoe making. Majority of the students engage in fashion design followed by barbing/hair.

Research question 1
Does the consideration of unemployment in the country influence students' participation in afterschool vocational training or part-time trade learning? Table 3 indicates students with high consideration of future unemployment measuring higher in part-time trade learning (M=0.65; SD= 0.48) than those who do not (M=0.35; SD= 0.48). This result tentatively indicates that consideration of future unemployment situation in the country influences students' participation in after-school trade learning.

Research question 2
Does combination of academic and vocational activities impact students' optimal academic performance?
The result indicates the variations between the two student groups are very low. Yet, it is observed that those who do not combine these activities measure higher on academic performance (M=515.75; SD=171.58) than those who do (M=513.52; SD=146.24).

Research question 3
Does combination of academic and vocational activities influence the stress health-related challenges likely to affect students.
In Table 5, students who engage in part-time apprenticeship along with their academics have higher stress-related risk factors (M=1.63; SD=0.49) compared to those who do not (M=1.42; SD=0.50). This indicates that combination of academic and part-time apprenticeship activities tends to influence stress-related challenges likely to be experienced by students in such a way that it increases their possibility of poor health status.

Hypothesis 1
Consideration of unemployment in the country has no significant association with students' combination of apprenticeship with academics.
In Table 5, consideration of future unemployment situation in the country has significant relationship with student's decision to take on apprenticeship simultaneously with academics [r (158) = 0.211, p < .05]. This is such that as the consideration of countering future difficulty in gaining employment increases, parent-student strategy of combining apprenticeship with academics tends to increase. This result negates hypothesis 1 and the null hypothesis is thus rejected.

Hypothesis 2
There is no significant relationship between students' combination of apprenticeship with academics and their academic performance.
As Table 6 indicates, relational effects of students' combination of apprenticeship and academics on academic performance, is not significant [t (158) = 0.089, p > .05]. This implies that the academic performance of students do not significantly differ when the two activities are considered. This result negates the alternate hypothesis 2 while the null hypothesis is upheld. However, when their mean scores are compared, those who do not combine academics with apprenticeship, scored higher (515.75) than those who did (513.52), with their standard deviation scores as 171.58 and 146.24, respectively.

Hypothesis 3
Students' combination of apprenticeship with academics has no significant relationship with health risk factors of stress. Table 7 reveals the relationship between students' combination of apprenticeship with academics and health risk factors of stress is positively significant [r (158) = .207, p < .01]. This implies that the more students engage in the combination of academics with apprenticeship activities, the more the possibility of stressrelated health risk factors likely to be experienced by such students. The result negates the formulated null hypothesis 3 and it is thus rejected.

DISCUSSION OF FINDINGS
The main objective of this study is to examine parents' strategy for tackling unemployment under a precarious economic milieu of preparing their children against that future challenge. This study is more of an exploratory effort as there is an acute dearth of literature in this regard, especially on the combination, due to the fact that little is known yet about the phenomenon. Hence, confirmation of results may in some cases, follow a general pattern in trying to situate findings within the specific body of apprenticeship literature. As analyses confirm the presence of the phenomenon under study, they unveil the deleterious effects of poor economic situation and the biting rate of unemployment in the country.
The present combination of studentship with apprenticeship translates to an important strategy by parents to prepare children and wards against such eventualities. That leads the discussion in the direction the some stated question: Does consideration of unemployment in the country influence students' participation in after-school apprenticeship training or part-time trade learning? In addition to statistical confirmation of the question, empirical studies suggest that apprenticeship drive of the economy and sensitization of policy makers in areas forthe provision of enabling environment for apprenticeship scheme to thrive are all in the consciousness of what youth apprenticeship could accomplish towards arresting the monster of perennial unemployment challenge in the country [24]. The concern affects both government and parents. It will appear counterproductive for the government to expend so much annually to train its teeming youth and arrange their NYSC programme only for them to return and start roaming the streets, constituting nuisance to the community! Besides, as social action theory submits, individual parents and students are motivated by their personal wants and goals including personal desires. One of these goals is future gainful employment, better life and economic self-reliance for children.
Caring parents, in order to train their children, have to go into huge debt with the hope that such children would one day serve as life pension and old-age endowment assurance to them. They are aware of the significance of good employment and the outcomes that may liberate the entire family from shackles of poverty and want. The choice being made to borrow, instead of spending at the moment, represents the sacrifice they have to make in order for them to train the youth. It is a rational choice indeed as economic terms of 'scale of preference,' 'opportunity cost' and other forms of value judgments would have to bear on their final decision to send the youth to school and train him. It becomes a serious tragedy, a hope aborted, if at the end of the academic exercise nothing is forthcoming. The poverty level and family system in Nigeria and indeed Africa is such that an individual who is financially buoyant has a retinue of dependents that have to be helped. The rational choice of present apprenticeship is to at least act as buffer to cushion the effect of lack and want in society.
Another question is: Could combination of academic and vocational activities impact students' optimal academic performance? This is equally positively confirmed statistically. Combining academics with apprenticeship and achieving optimal performance depends, according to Harackiewicz, Smith and Priniski [25], on interest of the students involved. They assert that interests increased attention, efforts and affection towards a particular topic or academic activity especially if the right policies are put in place. For example, "to teach math to a musician, talk about the mathematical principles inherent in music", they argued. Another is by way of triggering the interest of students in order to boost their interest in their learning. It is believed that students who are highly motivated in their academic life are likely to maintain that tempo all round in other end eavours they engage in especially with regards to outsideschool activities, apprenticeship inclusive. Much depends therefore on the learning environment at school and that, of course, depends on how experienced and motivated their school teachers are. To properly factor in apprenticeship, depends on the level of understanding of students when the parent seeks his opinion on part-time apprenticeship. Understanding by the student also depends on the persuasive way the counsel is presented by the parent in order to enlist his interest. Not only at school, must the interest also be spurred at home for effective take-off and completion of the part-time apprenticeship training.
Optimal performance also depends on perception of those involved. Crimson [26] perceives part-time apprenticeship as an extracurricular activity which according to them means the student is "going above and beyond his/her daily school requirements". Crimson [26] listed out the benefits of extracurricular activities such as essential life skills like goal setting, time management, problem solving, higher selfesteem and so on which are essential for building good personality. These skills are equally derived through good part-time apprenticeship.
As normal extracurricular activities improve students' skills through the above and more, so does part-time apprenticeship if properly perceived. If students on part-time apprenticeship trainings are exposed and motivated with proper counsel, performance in both seeming conflicting roles may be marvelous. Like normal extracurricular activity, initially, combination of apprenticeship with schooling may be challenging due to 'role strains' and 'role conflict' being encountered, so is extracurricular activity; but later on, 'role adjustment' will come up to reduce the strains and progress is attained. Question 3 states: Does combination of academic and vocational activities influence the stress health-related challenges likely to affect students? Several activities lead to stress among the youth. Two of them are relevant which are: homework and school (especially exams) and extracurricular commitments. This is the expression of effects of role conflict when the youth is saddled with several activities, which in our case, is part-time apprenticeship. This apparently results to role conflict situation in the combination of apprenticeship with studentship. This conflict results in health risk likely to affect performance of youth [26,13].
Furthermore, although anticipating future youth employment opportunity through present combination of apprenticeship with studentship inevitably results in role conflict and its attendant outcomes, it is actually necessary in order to adequately prepare them for a safe future. Conflict ensues in divided interest between being a student as well being an apprentice, but the compelling need to prepare for the future opens opportunity to act rationally and arrive at a better decision. This finding supports the view by Zimmermann [27] that the integration of vocational training (a model of apprenticeship) in the secondary schools of developing countries makes young people less vulnerable in the labour market, giving them better chances of employment. It is also in line with the view by Uwaifo [28] that the prospect of self-employment and a higher standard of living brightens the future of vocational and technical training in Nigeria.
Analyses further confirm that students' academic performance is not significantly affected by their involvement in part-time training. Although the mean differences indicate that students who do not combine the two activities measure higher academically than those who combine them. Full analyses between the two student populations do not indicate any significant relationship. This result contradicts a recent study by Akinde [29]. He had studied several after-school activities and academic performance of students in some selected schools in Ondo State, Nigeria. His study showed a significant relationship between students' involvement in after-school activities and their academic performance. As mentioned earlier in this study, analyses on the combination and stress-risk factors further indicate that the more students engage in combination of academics with apprenticeship in their quest for future employment and self-reliance, the greater the possibility of stress-related health risk factors. This is partly supported by Niemi and Vainiomaki [30] who concluded in their study that too much stress-related factors can cause physical and mental health problems.
As in the larger society, fashion design, barbing/hair dressing and phone repairs are three most patronized areas of part-time apprenticeship among student-apprentices. The trades are significant as part of occupations in the informal sector of the economy that provide leeway for unemployment in the developing countries burdened with acute socioeconomic crises [9]. As already mentioned above,in addition to the secondary students, the trades learnt have become sources of lucrative business around various university campuses in the country. Students carry the skills learnt with them to the campus; and after their admission into the university, the venture yields proceeds that form a significant part of their financial support. Empirical evidence confirms some youth coppers spend their leisure tending the trades during the NYSC year which later constitute a means of likelihood after the national service year. The ever-increasing list of evidence include using proceeds to complete their marriage preparations, giving support to their brothers who are just offered admission into the higher school of learning, buying and running motor bike (Okada) business and establishing other personal small scale businesses.

CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDA-TIONS
In the light of discussions above, students engage in part-time apprenticeship training in a bid to acquire relevant skills that would guarantee a better future for them and their family. They engage in these trainings with the hope that they would become either selfemployed or have better chances of employment in the labour market. It is pertinent to note that their involvement in part-time tradelearning is informed by their consideration of the unemployment situation in the country, even after acquiring the much-needed academic qualifications through regular education. It is also important to be aware of the health implications that combined activities could have on the personality and mental life of youth, as this could take a toll on their academic performance, ultimately. Students involved in combined activities have the tendency to experience more stress-related health risk issues due to role conflict and its attendant side-effects.It is equally important to note that educational interest fired up by relevant stakeholders through the provision of needed enabling environment could help to mitigate the incidence of role conflict outcomes on the students.
Parents should be educated on the health risks associated with engaging children in rigorous part-time training while the school is in session. Moreover, if students or their parents still feel the need to engage in part-time apprenticeship training, the schedule of these trainings should be restricted to weekends and long vacations; to enable students concentrate better on their academics and eventually come out with good grades; whilst still acquiring the much-sought apprenticeship skills.
Stakeholders in the educational sector are to facilitate the building apprenticeship scheme (vocational learning) as part of the framework of the secondary curriculum even beyond the Junior Secondary School level, in order to better equip students to take on these vocations in later life.

CONSENT
As per the international standard informed and written participant consent have been collected and preserved by the authors.

COMPETING INTERESTS
Authors have declared that no competing interests exist.