Comparative Analysis of Postgraduate Students' Thesis Supervision and Mentoring in Oyo State, Nigeria

A close look at situations in universities in Nigeria suggests that the majority of postgraduate students do not complete their programmes by the deadline, despite having completed coursework requirements for the programmes. Some even abandon their thesis and go on leave for reasons best known to them. This study did a comparative analysis of postgraduate students’ thesis supervision and mentoring in universities in Oyo State. The descriptive survey research design was adopted; the population included all postgraduate students in both public and private universities in Oyo State. A self developed instrument tagged ‘Postgraduate Thesis Supervision Questionnaire’ (PTSMQ) was used to source data for the study. According to the findings, there is a significant interaction between the university supervisors and supervisee and also a high level of mentoring. In a similar vein, the results showed that the supervision of postgraduate students theses in university, in Oyo state varied significantly according to the type of university (Private universities with mean = 2.73, SD = 0.856, P < 0.05) and public universities postgraduate students thesis supervision at (mean = 3.07, SD =1.196, P < 0.05). The study equally found a significant university type difference in mentoring of postgraduate student (private university mentoring with mean = 2. 83, SD = 0. 938, P < 0.05 and public university at mean = 3.15, SD = 1.203, P < 0.05). It was concluded that there was a significant difference in thesis supervision and mentoring among postgraduate students in universities in Oyo State. The study recommended among others, that efforts should be made by the government and university administrators to minimize the academic and administrative workload of postgraduate students' thesis supervisors to ensure they dedicate more time to thesis supervision and mentoring