JAMB can’t determine admission guidelines for varsities, says ASUU

From the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) came yesterday a declaration that the power to determine admission guidelines for universities is beyond the Joint Admission and Matriculation Board (JAMB).

 

Essentially, ASUU, while reminding the examination body of university autonomy, maintained that only the Senate of a tertiary institution has the power to regulate admission modalities and determine what best suits the vision of the school.

 

Chairman of the University of Ibadan (UI) chapter of ASUU, Dr. Deji Omole, in his reaction said both the Education Minister, Adamu Adamu and JAMB Registrar, Prof. Dibu Ojerinde erred in their actions. Omole said the duo appeared confused and inconsistent by first going against collection of administrative charges under Post- Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME) by universities and then preaching payment of screening fees in its guidelines.

 

The ASUU boss said both the minister and JAMB registrar seemed unaware of happenings in the nation’s universities as the “so called point-based scoring system” is not new. Omole, who noted that the scoring system being introduced by JAMB was innovated and used in UI for five years and abandoned, said the premier university had moved beyond such model of admitting students.

According to him, the question of admission is not about the introduction of screening charges. He said the union would resist any attempt to trample upon university autonomy and the supremacy of the Senate of universities to regulate its admission.

 

If the new guideline is allowed, Omole said, candidates who combined results from two sittings at O’levels would be deprived alongside awaiting result candidates.

 

“JAMB is acting beyond its mandate which is to conduct examinations and release results. Only the Senate of universities have the right to determine the model or guideline to adopt to admit their students from the pool of candidates sent to it by JAMB.

 

“Each university has standards which are not subjected to the whims and caprices of any government appointee. JAMB does not have the powers to tell universities how to conduct their screening. It is a way to cover up their inadequacies because JAMB’s credibility as an examination body is yearly being queried. JAMB and its handlers are confused.

 

“Last year they arbitrarily placed students in private universities to satisfy the needs of their cronies. These were mainly children of the poor who had not chosen those institutions. In the just concluded JAMB examinations, they awarded candidates with extra 40 marks without any justification. Now those with two sittings results will be short-changed and those awaiting results will be disadvantaged. There will be rise in result racketeering at WAEC again as people will be purchasing grade ‘A’ since that is what will guarantee admission.

 

“More miracle examination centres will spring up and both JAMB and the minister would have succeeded in entrenching corruption and further kill university education in Nigeria,” Omole said.

 

Source: The Guardian Newspaper

JAMB Officially Drops Cut-off Mark for 2016 Admission and Adopts Point System Option

JAMB has finally ditched the allocation of cut off-marks for admissions into tertiary institutions in Nigeria, the guideline for the 2016 admission process released on Monday evening has shown.

The Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB) has announced the release of its guidelines for the 2016 admissions’ process.

The method, described as the point system option, was adopted after an extensive one-week meeting JAMB had with universities and other tertiary institutions’ administrators in the country.

According to the guidelines contained in a statement placed on its website on Monday night, JAMB said that the modalities were going to be based on point system.

While explaining how the admission process would work for Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination candidates and direct entry students, the organisation stated that universities were going to charge fees for screening of candidates at the end of the process for admission.

According to JAMB, the new method uses a point system to offer provisional admission to candidates.

“Before a candidate can be considered for screening, he/she must have been offered a provisional admission by JAMB. The JAMB admission checker portal is going to be opened soon for this process, so praying is all you can do now,” JAMB said.

The second process, it said, was the point system where admission would depend on the point tally of the candidate.

The statement said, “JAMB’s provisional admission no longer makes much sense this year, your points tally will decide your faith. The points are evenly spread out between your O’ Level and JAMB results to provide a level-playing field for all.

“In the first case, any candidate who submits only one result which contains his/her relevant subjects already has 10 points. The exam could be NECO, WASSCE, November/December WASSCE etc, but any candidate who has two sittings only gets 2 points. So this means that candidates with only one result are at an advantage but only just.”

The organisation added that the “next point grades fell into the O’ Level grades where each grade would have it equivalent point; A=6 marks, B=4 marks, C=3 marks, so the better the candidates’ grades, the better his or her chances of securing admission this year.

“The next point is the UTME scores where each score range has its equivalent point which can be summarised thus, 180-200=20-23 marks, 200-250=24-33 points, 251-300=34-43, 300-400=44-60 points,” JAMB explained.

Giving a breakdown, JAMB explained that each category would contain five JAMB results per point added.

For example a candidate with 180-185 gets 20 points, while a candidate with 186-190 gets 21 points. JAMB added that the point system for direct entry would be released soon.

JAMB stated that fees would still be charged for screening which would replace the Post UTME test. It also emphasised that catchment and educationally less-developed state would still be used for admission into the nation’s tertiary institutions.

JAMB said, “Merit contains 45 per cent of the total candidates for a particular course, Catchment contains 35 per cent and ELDS and staff lists contains the rest. Cut off marks will be released by the institutions this year in the form of points and not marks.

“If a school declares its cut off mark for Medicine as 90 points and JAMB grants a candidate with 250 a provisional admission but his/her total points falls short of the 90 points, then he/she will lose the admission. So the provisional admission is just a means to an end, not the end in itself.”