2024 UTME: Education Minister Raises Alarm Over Number Of Under-age Candidates …. Says Minimum Age Is 18 years

Lulu Bangkong 

The Minister of Education, Professor Tahir Mamman has described as unacceptable the number of under-age candidates writing the 2024 Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME).

The Minister stated this Monday in Abuja after monitoring the on-going UTME examination in Bwari where the Headquarters of the Joint Admission and Matriculation Board (JAMB) is located.

According to him,
“The other thing which we notice is the age of those who have applied to go to the university, Some of them are really too young, we are going to look at it because they are too young to understand what the university education is all about, That’s the stage when students migrate from a controlled environment where they are in charge of their own affairs so if they are too young, they won’t be able to manage properly”.

He added that this under age category of students accounts for some of the problems being encountered in the tertiary institutions.

“We are going to look at that 18 is the entry age for university but you will see students, 15, 16, going to the examination, It is not good for us, parents should be encouraged not to push their wards, children too much.”

Professor Mamman, however commended the efforts of the Joint Admission and Matriculation Board (JAMB), describing the process as seamless.
“Right from screening to those who are here the examination process is seamless, The environment is comfortable for students, that’s how it should be especially with the use of technology in our affairs and the educational system, It makes life easy for everybody and seamless.
” As we know this examination is going on though out the country, It is being monitored every where seamlessly and from the report I have heard, the malpractice level is very low just a 100 out of the 1.2m, It has gone down drastically and believe that it is the use of technology that has made that happen so this is very good”.

Talking about the inability of tertiary institutions in the country to absorb all the candidates sitting for the examination the Minister said,
” I think the figure overall on average is about 20 percent; universities, polytechnics and colleges of educations.
The question you ask is where are the 80 percent? They are our children, our wards living with us. This is why the issue of skills acquisition is terribly important because any students who is not being able to proceed to tertiary education, should be able to have a meaningful life even after secondary school, even primary education actually”.

“The only solution to that is skills; by taking skills right from the time they enter school, for the primary right through the educational trajectory somebody should finish with one skill or another that is part of the assumption of the 6-3-3-4. It is assumed that by the time student finishes up to JSS level, he would have acquired some skills. If he does not proceed to senior secondary level, he would have acquired some skills that will help him navigate life and seize to be a burden on parents and society”.

Earlier, the Minister of State for education, Yusuf Sununu, who monitored the exercise quite early in the morning said
” I have seen a complete effort, most importantly to completely reduce to the barest minimum eliminate of examination malpractice, and then given the standard of what is needed to be given in an exam so that we can have objectivity and reliability of results”.

“One of the major things I see here, which is a major characteristic of online exam, is the speed. The speed in the centre is really excellent one, pages are turned as at when candidates need them without any delay of booting” he said.

“The standard of the exam is commendable. I am not surprised that JAMB has to go outside Nigeria to go to other countries to conduct exams, they were in Saudi Arabia and right now the exam is also going (on) in Saudi Arabia”