JAMB messing with students’ future by Abdulrofiu Temitayo

By Abdulrofiu Muhammed Temitayo

Over time, the conduct of examinations overseen by the Joint Admission and Matriculation Board, JAMB, has been riddled with speculation. Whether these speculations have been true of false, they have always resulted in an attack on the reputation of JAMB, its integrity and the state of technical and managerial inadequacies killing the developmental potency of the body, thereby reducing to nothingness the very essence of setting up the body.

Not far-fetched is the headache of the grading system of the supposedly reputable examination body which became a subject of controversy, especially recently, when the overall performance of the examination regulatory body became one of the worst (should one say poorest?) in the history of the examination meant to check the academic vibrancy of the students and candidates seeking admission into universities, polytechnics and colleges of educations using the most efficient methods, equipment and staff. Rather than the expected improvement and efficiency, the reverse was experienced from a body which much had been given – machines meant to optically grade papers malfunctioned and affected the students’ destinies and future. What an embarrassment! Such a huge embarrassment.

When I was in secondary school, learning the almost miraculous wonders that the computer and other machines can perform was interesting. Stuck in my brain was that these machines cannot replace human effort outrightly; if not for anything, for the
fact that human beings will have to monitor, service and prepare the computer for next tasks. Obviously, the 2016 JAMB examination kicked off 28 February, 2016 and ended on March 15,2016. And those who wrote the examination on two particular days were fortunate. Most of them had scored less than 200 (according to JAMB), they reportedly got an additional 40 marks each to recitify the unfortunate situations students encountered during the examination.

Their joy and celebrations were, however, cut short when they went to print the results. It was an utter disappointment that took over after the candidates realised that the same scores had been deducted. JAMB went ahead to award scores ranging from less than 200 to 213 in many cases. These scores are now the commonest among the candidates currently. This has further injured the delicate reputation of JAMB as many now wonder if officials of the body actually looked at the students’ examination papers or just awarded scores after looking at the passport photographs of the students without the real assessment/test.

The students have complained of malfunctioning computer systems, power failure, irregular options to examination questions, illegal transfer of candidates from their choices of the examination to states far from them, given candidates subjects they did not apply for, and up to five days of not seeing their results as well as deduction of their marks some days after they received their results through text message, getting results even before the sitting for the examination.

One can recall the case of a candidate who chose Lagos for the examination but was sent to Osun by JAMB. Her name is Aishah Bello. She lamented: “this year’s UTME is full of errors; when student are denied their marks, the entire process was a failure per se. We want another examination not like this one that was called examination.”

By all indication, this girl is suggesting the right solution for UTME at this crucial moment when JAMB does not even know the next thing to do. The only solution right now is to reschedule a fresh examination in the next couple of weeks to this time so as to let candidates believe in the body again. Also, JAMB needs to apologise to all Nigerians for this failure which it presumes would never occur any longer.

Temitayo writes from Osogbo, Osun state capital and can be reached on [email protected]