Malam Adamu Adamu, Nigeria’s Education Minister
The Joint Admissions and Matriculations Board (JAMB), is the central body responsible for the admission of students to tertiary institutions of learning in Nigeria. It administers its tests once every year but allows students to pick the schools of their choice, allowing for school of first choice and so on.
But quite recently, the body in a statement in Abuja, the Federal capital, released a statement which claimed that there will be different cut-off marks for different universities. This development has received criticisms from educators and other stakeholders across Nigeria.
Before we look at the issue of whether JAMB is right or wrong, let us first take a look at the examination itself.
First, JAMB examinations are standardised tests. Let us then define a standardised test.
A standardized test according to The Glossary for Education Reform is any form of test that (1) requires all test takers to answer the same questions, or a selection of questions from common bank of questions, in the same way, and that (2) is scored in a “standard” or consistent manner, which makes it possible to compare the relative performance of individual students or groups of students.
What makes JAMB tests standardised, is that they items (1) and (2) are common factors in its testing procedures. That is why a cut-off mark is needed for admission in the first place.
But with the new directive by The Registrar of JAMB, Prof. Is-haq Oloyede that JAMB “will also allow for flexible cut-off marks and candidates…’’ does not align with the definition of a Standardised test.
Educators and concerned stakeholders have chided the JAMB Chief over the statement, with some arguing that it is a trick to allow those who tag themselves “educationally disadvantaged,” to continue to hold the nation to ransom. These stakeholders reason that if the test is a standardised test, all takers should meet the same requirement for admission. This means that the same cut-off mark should be used to admit all students across all the universities in Nigeria.
Let us take for example other standardized tests.
For those Nigerians seeking admission to schools in Europe and America, it is common knowledge that they must take SAT, IELTS, LSAT, GRE etc.
The above standardised test scores are maintained by those foreign institutions, so that foreign students who seek admission to their schools, can communicate when they arrive in those countries.
Because of the double standards practiced by the Federal Government of Nigeria, in what is termed “Quota System,” the country has suffered many setbacks in the area of technological and other developments.
To the surprise of many, some of the purported “rescued” Chibok Girls told journalists after their release from captivity, that “We are grateful to the Federal Government for teaching us English.” This came as a shock to a vast number of people, some of who asked: “With what language were they taught from Primary One to Senior Secondary (SS3). These were girls who were supposed to write their Terminal Examination, the West African Examination Council (WAEC) standardised test just before they were taken into captivity.
If at that level, they can’t speak and write in English, how then were they going to write and pass their examination. For these caliber of ill-prepared students, JAMB is willing to sacrifice Merit for Mediocrity.
It is shameful for the Giant of Africa to continue along this line.
This is a wake-up call.
Afro-Global Education Deliveries 