Gabriel Dike
The 2019 admissions exercise into universities, polytechnics, colleges of education and innovation enterprise institutions (IEIs) will commence on Monday, August 14 for both public and private institutions.
The 19th policy meeting on admissions to tertiary institutions in Nigeria held on Tuesday, June 11, at Bola Babalakin Auditorium, Gbongan, Osun State decided the fate of 1,886,508 million candidates that sat for the 2019 Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME).
The policy meeting attracted the Director of Tertiary Education, Mr. Joel Ojo, Deputy Governor of Osun State, Mr. Benedict Alabi, vice chancellors, rectors, provosts, Director General of NYSC, Brigadier General Shuaibu Ibrahim, board members of JAMB led by the chairman, Dr. Emmanuel Ndukwe, heads of education agencies and JAMB Registrar, Prof Is-haq Oloyede.
The board and heads of tertiary institutions agreed that 2019 admissions exercise will start August 21, end November (first choice) for public institutions and private universities.
Oloyede stressed that first choice admission (merit) will run between August 21 and November 16 for public institutions while second choice begins November 14 to December, while admissions into private universities end February 15.
FIRST HURDLE FOR CANDIDATES
The 2019 UTME and Direct Entry (DE) registration exercise commenced on Thursday, January 10 and ended on Thursday, February 21. No fewer than 1, 886, 508 million candidates applied. The mock examination which took place on Saturday, February 24 was meant to identify problems, test new system introduced and allow candidates familiarise themselves with new software as well as test their level of preparedness.
The mock examination took place on April 1. The real exam, which held from Thursday April 11 to 18th was conducted in 689 Computer Based Test (CBT) centres in Nigeria and seven other foreign countries.
The board suspended 118 CBT centres for one irregularity or another while 18 others were sanctioned for one or two years for infractions ranging from charging higher than the authorised fees, lack of computers and illegal registration.
On May 11, JAMB released the results of the 2019 UTME after the management studied the reports from field officials and forensic analysis with the aid of close circuit television (CCTv) footages.
The 1, 792, 715 million results released excluded 34,120 withheld for various irregularities while about 59, 667 candidates were absent.
The Education Report investigations revealed that 90 per cent of the candidates who wrote the 2019 UTME did so as awaiting result candidates and are hoping that WAEC and NECO will release the results before the institutions start the admissions exercise.
MINISTERIAL DIRECTIVE ON 2019 ADMISSIONS
Mr. Ojo, who represented the Permanent Secretary, Federal Ministry of Education, Sonny Echono while declaring the policy meeting open, said it remained the acceptable forum where plans and programmes for admissions are discussed and approved to guide the conduct of placement of qualified candidates to tertiary institutions in Nigeria.
He noted that the decisions taken at the gathering have numerous implications on lives of many youth in the country, adding ‘’it, therefore, behooves on us to be very sensitive, transparent, honest and sincere in our consideration of the guidelines, regulations and principles on the admissions exercise.’’
Echono disclosed that the Federal Ministry of Education has approved seven guidelines in addition to the decisions of the policy meeting on the 2019 admission exercise.
He stressed that no institution should charge above the ministerial approved fee N2,000 for post-UTME screening exercise.
The director of tertiary education said all admissions to all programmes leading to the award of first degree, national diploma and Nigeria Certificate in Education must be processed through the Central Admissions Processing System (CAPS) of JAMB.
He urged the board and the tertiary institutions to ensure that candidates under the special needs category are considered for admission provided they meet the minimum requirements. They include blind and deaf candidates, prison candidates, foreign centre candidates. The government exempted these candidates from any other test apart from routine scrutiny of their credentials.
In order to halt the substitution of candidates with impersonators, the government directed JAMB to make available to tertiary institutions the facial and finger images of the respective candidates of each institution for the screening exercise.
The director said it is not permitted for any institution to retake fresh photographs or finger prints, warning, ‘’any institution that deliberately or inadvertently allows the impersonators to penetrate the system will be considered an accomplice and will be so treated.’’
The ministry warned that tertiary institutions must ensure that all decisions reached at the policy meeting are complied with.
Prior to the meeting, various institutions were requested to submit their minimum acceptable scores with public universities presenting between 150 to 200 and private universities presenting 120 to 160. At the policy meeting, the submissions from respective institutions were collated and reviewed.
Some public universities, which had submitted cut off mark of less than 160 were urged to upgrade so as to have a uniform cut off mark of 160 across the board while private universities cut off mark was pegged at 140.
The meeting also approved 120 and 110 as cut off marks for public polytechnics and private polytechnics respectively after reviewing their submissions. For colleges of education, 100 and above was approved as the cut off mark as against 90 for IEIs.
It took the heads of tertiary institutions and JAMB about one hour to agree on the cut off marks as some institutions demanded special consideration which the JAMB Registrar, Prof. Oloyede turned down.
Prof. Oloyede reiterated the need to adhere to the respective cut off marks as well as the earlier directive of the Federal Ministry of Education that admissions into all tertiary institutions for both full, part-time, National Open University of Nigeria (NOUN) and sandwich programmes would be conducted through the Central Admissions Processing System (CAPS).
He explained that candidates cannot be considered for admission on awaiting results, stating ‘’they must upload their O’level results on the board’s portal before the commencement of admission exercise . Their O’level results form a crucial part of their registration requirements.’’
He revealed that 1, 112,589 million candidates wrote the 2019 UTME as awaiting results applicants and 674,779 others did same with their WASSCE and NECO SSCE results , which they uploaded on JAMB portal.
Prof Oloyede warned that no admission can be initiated from JAMB and that it must come from the institutions.
Also, at the policy meeting it was agreed that JAMB and the tertiary institutions are to ensure that admissions periods are sacrosanct and must be followed and adhered to. Specifically, it was agreed that first choice admissions must be done during the period earmarked for first choice. At the end of the first choice period, all candidates not admitted would be pulled out of the institutions’ platform on CAPS and be made available to other willing institutions.
It was also resolved that any candidate who chose an institution as second, third or fourth choice does not need any change of choice or payment to JAMB to be considered for admission during the period of the second choice admission.
Governor of Osun State, Mr. Adegboyega Oyetola, who was represented by his Deputy, Mr. Benedict Alabi, called for a crisis-free admission process to ensure that only qualified candidates were admitted.