Prerequisites for Millinery Art Skills Acquisition by Higher National Diploma Fashion Design Students in Ghana

Abstract

The art of millinery has been in decline despite its significant contribution to the performance of fashion design students in the industry. This study investigated the prerequisite skills of HND fashion design students in the acquisition of millinery art skills in technical universities in Ghana. The sample consisted of 249 HND level 200 students and 31 millinery art lecturers from five selected Technical Universities. The study employed multistage and stratified sampling methods to gather data from the participants. Data was gathered through the utilisation of an interest inventory and a semi-structured interview guide. The study data was analysed using frequency tables to assess the relationship between prerequisite skills and the acquisition of millinery art skills. A Chi-square Test of Independence was conducted to examine the association between the millinery art skills acquired and practised in the participants’ institutions. The findings revealed that the students possessed the necessary skills and exhibited a genuine interest in millinery art before enrolling in the Fashion Design program. However, their interest waned following their instruction in millinery art at different educational institutions. The null hypothesis indicating that there is no relationship between the institution attended and the millinery art skills acquired and practised by students, was rejected based on the statistical analysis. The chi-square value was 135.42, with 4 degrees of freedom and a sample size of 249. The p-value was found to be 0.000, which is less than the significance level of 0.05. The study suggests that Technical Universities should assist lecturers in obtaining industrial training in millinery art. This will improve the acquisition of millinery art skills.