“Oyo stops payment of WASSCE fees”, PUNCH, August 20, 2015.

By Dele Sobowale

THE announcement concerning the change of policy was made by Mr Soji Eniade, the state’s Head of Service. In addition, “pupils in secondary schools in the state would start paying N3,000 per session.” Oyo is the first, but will not be the last state, even in the old Western Region to jettison the long-held pretense to free education. Soon, states paying for JAMB and UMTE will also pass the buck to the parents.

Furthermore, the introduction of N3,000 per session “Development Levy” is only a start. That levy will be increased at least once before the government of Ajimobi becomes history.    A few weeks before that announcement, the nation had gone through another annual ritual of release of West African School Certificate, WASCE, results in which over sixty per cent of the pupils failed Mathematics and English – the two most vital subjects.

The same kids will sit for the JAMB examinations this year and the vast majority will score less than 200. They will proceed to UMTE and, again, the same vast majority will score less than fifty per cent. Then, misguided parents, public commentators and the applicants themselves will regard such dullards as university material.

“Garbage In Garbage Out”, GIGO, repeats itself each year, all because we have not told ourselves the truth which stares us in the face. The vast majority of our secondary school students are simply not admissible in any self-respecting university.

Having swollen the population of those university-bound by padding the figures with dullards, we proceed to the next lie. We have actually convinced ourselves that there are more applicants than available vacancies in our universities. Actually, once we remove the dullards, we will discover that there is sufficient vacancy for serious students.

The lies we have been telling ourselves have had serious consequences for our university education. President Jonathan, a former university Lecturer, badly advised, and in a fit of personal absent-mindedness, approved the establishment of eleven (11) new Federal universities, over twenty private universities and converted about half a dozen Colleges of Education to universities – all in a bid to accommodate the horde of dullards – without giving a thought to the cost of maintaining a decent university and where the funds will come from.

Certainly, Presidents coming into office after Jonathan, will find a monster problem waiting for them as funding will become a major, if not, intractable problem. Buhari will be the first victim of the series of lies which culminated in the rash decisions to establish so many universities at once.

Already, Governor Ajimobi is receiving attack from political opponents who want to score cheap points without looking at the problem objectively. Other states will soon follow; as each state discovers that with crude oil now heading for US$30 per barrel, they will no longer be able to operate “free education” at primary and secondary school levels; neither will they be able to pay WASSCE, JAMB and UMTE fees.

With parents now called upon to fund their kids’ education, it will soon be clear to all of us, that mass failure at WAEC and JAMB examinations are directly related to the fact that with “free education” most parents have nothing at stake in the performance of their kids. It is not their money if the kids fail woefully. Similarly, teachers are not concerned because there is no penalty if a teacher repeatedly sends kids to WAEC, JAMB, UMTE, only for ninety per cent of them to fail.

JAMB, which was patterned after the American central admission system, has become the recipient of pupils who are mostly unprepared for any university. Yet, it is supposed to process them.

That would have been bad enough. Nigeria, unlike America, had super-imposed on JAMB and the universities, several other conditions for admission which have no basis in academic excellence. Hence, in the top universities – Ilorin, Ibadan, Lagos, Nsukka, Portharcourt, Zaria, Ife – you find people who scored 170 in the same class with those who scored 280-320. The same individuals with low scores probably are on provisional admission while waiting to pass Maths and English at the next WAEC examination.

The American central admission system which we bastardized does not permit provisional admission, because every criterion for admission must have been satisfied by the applicant before entering class as a Freshman (level 100). Some have called for the abolition of JAMB. I think that is too rash a step. To me JAMB should be retained but it should be operated like the US system. Every applicant should indicate three or four universities to which her/his result will be sent.

There should be no “First Choice, Second Choice” etc. Each university should also declare its cut-off point in advance. So, if Unilag says its minimum is 240, any applicant must attempt to achieve 240 or better; otherwise, forget Unilag. Once this is done, we will see a steep decline in the number of applicants for all our    universities.

Finally, all the universities should have autonomy, as long as they don’t cheat on their admission policy. No President of the United States can force his kid on Harvard University or any university for that matter. That should be our central policy.