High UTME Score, Not Guarantee For Admission - JAMB

The Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB) has said that candidates who scored above the required cut-off marks in this year’s Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME) must also meet oth­er requirements put in place by tertiary institutions of their choice before they can be of­fered admission.

JAMB Registrar, Prof. Is-haq Oloyede, said that uni­versities and other institu­tions consider various criteria that include performance in UTME, post-UTME, catch­ment area, gender balance, O’ level result, among others, be­fore they offer candidates ad­mission.

He spoke on Thursday in Abuja at a sensitisation and training workshop on JAMB’s Central Admission Processing System (CAPS).

Oloyede said that candi­dates without the required five credits in O’ Level examination will automatically be shut out from the admission process.

“JAMB will not even con­sider candidates without ei­ther O’ Level or A’ Level re­sults, that is why CAPS says you must have at least five credits,” he said.

According to him, the 120-minimum cut-off mark for universities and 100 for oth­er tertiary institutions is just a threshold below which institu­tions cannot admit candidates even as he expressed surprise over the criticisms that trailed the new admission benchmark.

He said: “Cut-off mark is not really a pass mark, scoring higher than the cut-off mark does not guarantee admission.”

While declaring there could be no need for UTME if there were enough admission spaces in tertiary institutions in the country, Oloyede said that the low number of candidates seeking admission into the na­tion’s private universities was not unconnected to the fees be­ing charged by the institutions.

“Lower your fees to get more students, that is what I tell private universities,” the JAMB boss said, adding that the fees charged by the universities are not as high as what Nigerians spend on some mushroom uni­versities in some African coun­tries.

“The school fees of private universities are high but not as high as travelling outside the country. People still send their children to universities in oth­er countries and you will see students under ‘tents’ taking courses,” Oloyede said.