Following
the controversy about cut-off points and the threat to go to war over
scores, Azu Ishiekwene explains that our school system is broken and in
need of urgent repairs.
Anyone who read the papers last week will be forgiven to think that
the worst demons from hell have descended on the Joint Admissions and
Matriculation Board (JAMB).
I have never liked JAMB, but not because I ever attempted to take
its exam or failed it. I guess I’m like most Direct Entry students who
think JAMB is one of the most useless bureaucracies that have robbed
universities of their brains.
But the universities have always loved it because its obtrusiveness
guarantees a balance of shady aspirations. Either through JAMB or
through vice chancellors, the worst candidates can get admission,
whether they pass or fail entrance examinations.
Some public universities have even created a slew of backdoor
short-term programs to short-circuit minimum entry qualification or any
entrance examination. And the private universities are always waiting in
the wings to harvest from the misery of those who fail to get a place
in the few notable public universities. It's cash-and-carry.
As another admission season approaches, the chicken is coming home
to roost, and vice chancellors are conveniently pretending that they had
no hand in muddying the nest.
The widespread headline that JAMB had lowered the university
cut-off mark to 120 – and that other tertiary institutions had followed
suit – was produced by the vice chancellors and co. and shamefully
promoted by the press.
The inside story is far less flattering. About ten days ago, JAMB
convened a stakeholders meeting in Abuja to discuss the procedure for
the 2017 admissions into universities. That would have been unthinkable
in the early days of JAMB.
All that the Board was required to do back then was to conduct
examinations and release the results to the universities. The 13 vice
chancellors that played a major role in founding JAMB did so because
they needed a clearing house to prevent duplication, which had become a
serious problem.
It made sense. But as time went on, however, the JAMB tail began to
wag the university dog and the Abuja meeting ten days ago was supposed
to be yet another moment for the tail to play.
But JAMB Registrar and former Vice Chancellor of the University of
Ilorin, Ishaq Oloyede, appears to have demurred, pressing for something
different. Instead of JAMB performing its self-appointed role of fixing
cut-off marks, he suggested that the Vice Chancellors, Provosts and
Rectors present should take the lead, but warned that, this time, the
schools would be bound strictly by whatever they submitted. A
computerized Central Admissions Processing System was also going to be
installed to create a more transparent process.
Even in the past when JAMB took on the arbitrary role of fixing
cut-off marks, the universities still set their own cut-off marks and
admitted whomever they wanted. Under an incredibly fraudulent system
known as discretionary admission, the universities could admit
candidates far below any advertised cut-off mark. The intakes often
included candidates without even the basic credit passes.
Such backdoor candidates were then allowed to “regularize” their
results before graduation when a reconciliatory list entitled “Late
Application by Institution” is sent to JAMB for "regularization" yearly.
Virtually all the universities are involved in this fraud, which shuts
the door against hundreds of thousands of qualified candidates.
In 2016, for example, six of the country’s top universities
presented a backdoor list of 385 students – from those who scored below
the cut-off to those who didn’t even take any entrance examination – to
JAMB for “regularization.” Ahmadu Bello University topped the list with
246 students; University of Nigeria, Nsukka, 52; Obafemi Awolowo
University, 33; University of Benin, 28; University of Lagos, 14; and
University of Ibadan, 12.
It was worse in the polytechnics, where four notable institutions
admitted 3,489 students through the backdoor. Kaduna Polytechnic
admitted 985 students by just winking at them; Yaba Polytechnic, once
the pride of the nation, trucked in 930; Ibadan Polytechnic ferried in
903; and Delta State Polytechnic, Ozoro, bussed in 671 misfits.
Why are we splitting hairs over cut-off point? High or low, the
schools have perfected how to get around it and the only reason there is
so much noise this time is that they know that their days are numbered.
At least two vice chancellors present at the Abuja meeting informed
me that it was not JAMB but the administrators comprising the Vice
Chancellors, Provosts, Rectors and Registrars present who lowered the
cut-off points after they were informed, among other things, that the
“Late Application by Institution" list will no longer apply.
If JAMB wants to be taken seriously, it should immediately publish
the list of all cut off points submitted by the schools and also advise
them to publish the names of students admitted and their scores on their
websites. That way, every candidate becomes a monitor and a potential
whistleblower.
An open review/ranking system by an independent private sector
group could also help shed light on the education market, and over time,
moderate demand and supply.
Before we miss it, however, the cut-off point is a symptom of the malaise in our higher schools.
There must be very few countries, if any at all, like Nigeria,
where former heads of state, their deputies and former senior government
officials own and operate some of the best private schools, set up with
the funds raked in from the ruins of public schools.
When public officials began to undermine the public school system
only to set up their own schools after leaving office, it was clear we
were heading for trouble.
But that’s not the end of it. After the ding-dong between the
missions and governments at the state and federal levels left schools in
the lower rung severely damaged, universities, especially, became the
new nannies.
Whereas the number of students applying to higher education across
the UK, for example, has fallen with more and more opting out to explore
the world after functional, basic education, the yearly university rush
in Nigeria can only accommodate less than 25 percent of the ever
increasing applicants.
The system is broken. With the lower levels bereft of a modicum of
functional education and technical and vocational colleges a shadow of
themselves, only universities appear good enough to quench the
incredible appetite for worthless certificates.
Unfortunately, the universities cannot cope with the influx, and
standards have gone down. So too have the scores and cut-off points
regardless of what is advertised.
Sure, there are a few universities struggling against the odds but
they are overwhelmed by mediocrity among even their own staff and
faculty. Were these fellows to be tested, they might even score lower
than the backdoor candidates we’re concerned about.
The controversy about cut-off points and the threat to go to war
over scores miss the point. Our school system is broken and in need of
urgent repairs.
****
Ishiekwene is the MD/Editor-In-Chief of The Interview magazine and board member of the Paris-based Global Editors Network
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