Abstract:
The main focus of this paper is to identify the various challenges facing students in tertiary institutions while pursuing their educational goals. The common concerns of these students center around how to cope with learning, peer pressure, and the variety of different thoughts that run through their minds, which seem lofty and unachievable in real life.
A qualitative design was used to conduct the study, which allows for verbal description of settings, procedures, and behaviors in order to capture the full pictures of situations and dynamics within the school. A convenience sampling technique was used to select 949 participants as the sample size from the total student population of Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria, in the 2015/2016 academic session. A designed client form was used to collect data from the participants. The data was analyzed using simple frequency count and percentages.
The result revealed that students experience numerous challenges, such as academic, personal, social, emotional, sexual, courtship, and drug problems, while pursuing their educational activities. It is, therefore, recommended that the provision of counseling services and other techniques be used to assist students in coping with the problems of acquiring education in a tertiary institution.