I would be talking about the process whereby aspirants are being admitted into our Federal and State Universities especially into competitive programs like Medicine, Law, Pharmacy, Dentistry, Nursing etc. Generally, it is required of aspirants to sit for the UTME and Post Utme examinations and those whose marks are up to the universities' released cut off marks are thus admitted.

Unfortunately, it has become a tradition that students who thrive to score high marks are being denied admission every year in most schools simply because of the excessively high cut off marks that is always being released by these schools.

As someone who is very conversant with the system, I would like to tell you that cut off marks for example; Medicine, are intentionally raised to the extent that those that become admitted using the cut off do not exceed 10 out of the expected 100 that are meant to be admitted. The remaining 90 are then admitted through back doors and connections.
That is when someone with 300+ jamb result would not get admitted while someone with 220 will be given admission.

Examples are the cut off marks recently released by Unilag and OAU, 81% and 79% for Medicine respectively. If you ask an insider well, he/she will tell you that those that score up to the mark are not more than 10 or thereabout.
Another example is the first admission list released by LAUTECH where only seven candidates who score up to the cut off mark were admitted for Medicine.

It is a pity that it has been like this for years, where more qualified candidates are denied admission because they are not well connected. This could also affect the quality of graduates that would be produced.

As a 200level Medical student, I would tell you that there are some of my colleagues who if things were done properly should not be in Medicine. Some of them would ask for the chemical formula of e.g; Sodium hydroxide. It is that barbaric.

I want to use this medium to appeal to all stakeholders in the education sector especially the NUC, to please for the sake of the masses who thrive to study hard despite various other challenges, to set out modalities and monitor those institutions on how our students, at least 80% would be admitted through a reasonable Merit cut off (and not the usual 10% or thereabout admitted through Merit caused by excessively high cut off marks) and the remaining 20% through connections since someone has said ruling the tradition out totally is impossible.

This will go far to create opportunity for the brilliant less privilege student, it will also bring about equality since as Nigerian citizens, we all own the facilities used in the training of our students.

.

Front page please, they should do something to this issue

front page

Exactly, Ops is very correct, could u believe dat with my 290+ and strong o level result i did not beat my course(mbbs) cutt off mark? But one idiot with 214 was admited


infact, i am tired of this country

@op your generalisation of those who passed the cutoff not up to 10 is baseless especially relating schools like OAU, Unilag to your discussion.
Schools especially OAU,UI and Unilag are very competitive and as such higher cut off marks are expected of them.
Check Unilag post Utme results, the highest score was 28/30(93%) and with over 200 students scoring above 80% (these group of students chose the so called competitive courses especially medicine) what do you expect to be the cutoff? 80% may look so high but these students are smart these days and same time smashing the exams from WAEC to JAMB to Utme screening.
I can only talk of Ife(OAU) right now, Saying 10% as those admitted based on merit is nonsensical and baseless,cause I know about 20+ admitted based on merit during my time.
I don't know the school you are attending but having good number of students in your courseof study who cannot express a simple chemical compound calls for this question, which school do you attend?
Finally I don't know about modus operandi of other schools and so I can't generalise , I think back door admission is mostly common in state owned schools(I may be wrong) and call for NUC to step up to investigate all schools.

Ujawissy:
@op your generalisation of those who passed the cutoff not up to 10 is baseless especially relating schools like OAU, Unilag to your discussion.
Schools especially OAU,UI and Unilag are very competitive and as such higher cut off marks are expected of them.
Check Unilag post Utme results, the highest score was 28/30(93%) and with over 200 students scoring above 80% (these group of students chose the so called competitive courses especially medicine) what do you expect to be the cutoff? 80% may look so high but these students are smart these days and same time smashing the exams from WAEC to JAMB to Utme screening.
I can only talk of Ife(OAU) right now, Saying 10% as those admitted based on merit is nonsensical and baseless,cause I know about 20+ admitted based on merit during my time.
I don't know the school you are attending but having good number of students in your courseof study who cannot express a simple chemical compound calls for this question, which school do you attend?
Finally I don't know about modus operandi of other schools and so I can't generalise , I think back door admission is mostly common in state owned schools(I may be wrong) and call for NUC to step up to investigate all schools.

Backdoor admission is also rampant in federal institutions. Another example is your own case where you said only 20+ were admitted based on merit for a course whose quota is up to 100. Where do the remaining 80 students come from. There are expected to be catchment areas where some other students may be admitted but still, opportunities should be given to those who thrive to have high scores by making the Merit cut off mark accommodate up to 70% of the students and the remaining comes through catchment and connection. I don't think there is that public institution already in Nigeria that admits 80% of its students for competitive courses like Medicine via Merit. The height that can happen is 20% or so and it is very rare.

Hmmm

It inconclusive

genjb:
Backdoor admission is also rampant in federal institutions. Another example is your own case where you said only 20+ were admitted based on merit for a course whose quota is up to 100. Where do the remaining 80 students come from. There are expected to be catchment areas where some other students may be admitted but still, opportunities should be given to those who thrive to have high scores by making the Merit cut off mark accommodate up to 70% of the students and the remaining comes through catchment and connection. I don't think there is that public institution already in Nigeria that admits 80% of its students for competitive courses like Medicine via Merit. The height that can happen is 20% or so and it is very rare.

You got him wrong. He meant those he knew personally to have been admitted on merit and not the entire number of persons admitted on merit.

I hope you're not trying to absolve private universities of this blame because merit is not a list there.

I understand your points. But saying that those admitted on merit are not more that 20% is not correct.

These schools you mentioned, OAU, UI, IFE, UNILAG and so on, many smart aspirants blast the cut-off point yearly. You can only talk of the ones you know, many even end up not being admitted despite scoring so high. But back door admission? I don't think it would be that easy to erase that out of the system even if your suggestion is adopted especially for courses like medicine, the luckiest are admitted using the cut-off marks. There are always reserved spaces for THEIR children.

During my time, I beat the cut off mark which was pagged and 70 then. My name didn't show up in the first 3 lists while others that didn't even score up to that had been admitted. It's always like that, considering the number of aspirants. Every lecturer wants their family to study medicine .

Backdoor admission thrives.

Ujawissy:
@op your generalisation of those who passed the cutoff not up to 10 is baseless especially relating schools like OAU, Unilag to your discussion.
Schools especially OAU,UI and Unilag are very competitive and as such higher cut off marks are expected of them.
Check Unilag post Utme results, the highest score was 28/30(93%) and with over 200 students scoring above 80% (these group of students chose the so called competitive courses especially medicine) what do you expect to be the cutoff? 80% may look so high but these students are smart these days and same time smashing the exams from WAEC to JAMB to Utme screening.
I can only talk of Ife(OAU) right now, Saying 10% as those admitted based on merit is nonsensical and baseless,cause I know about 20+ admitted based on merit during my time.
I don't know the school you are attending but having good number of students in your courseof study who cannot express a simple chemical compound calls for this question, which school do you attend?
Finally I don't know about modus operandi of other schools and so I can't generalise , I think back door admission is mostly common in state owned schools(I may be wrong) and call for NUC to step up to investigate all schools.

While I was in OAU addimission wasn't based on merit.... I can tell you that for sure.... 2000- 2006.. Do you know how many times I made cut off mark.... Do you know how many times I surpass my catchment area..

Funny thing is when list comes out.... 80% will score below you..
I remember when I have to use the influence of Oba olagbegi... Still it was late I was advised to wait another year.. Because the only place they could have me was eco-edu.

Do you know who helped me later... " A cleaner" an old woman. Who took me to fatukasi at the Senate building..

I can't forgive OUA for wasting my time honestly.... Forget the alma mater thing.. You will know that schooling in Nigeria is rubbish When go school abroad...

The minister of health is correct by his statement that some doctors will become farmers, we are chunning out half baked low quality medical school graduates and this is the one of the reason for many medical mishaps and death in our health institutions. NUC please intervene and do something urgently to stern this evil tide.

The writer has a point. There is no harm if we have NUC follow up on this

Back door admission is rampant but not as much as you have implied in your post where only 10 % is admitted based on merit.
But it would be a disaster to give the NUC controls over admissions in universities. They should make sure that everyone is admitted based on the cut off mark set by the school but not set the cut off mark themselves.

The writer and interested people could request for the UTME scores of candidates given Medicine and Law in the last 5years from select federal schools. The request would be made citing the FOI act. The findings would obviously be shocking, then we could have a senate hearing or move straight to court

genjb:
I would be talking about the process whereby aspirants are being admitted into our Federal and State Universities especially into competitive programs like Medicine, Law, Pharmacy, Dentistry, Nursing etc. Generally, it is required of aspirants to sit for the UTME and Post Utme examinations and those whose marks are up to the universities' released cut off marks are thus admitted.

Unfortunately, it has become a tradition that students who thrive to score high marks are being denied admission every year in most schools simply because of the excessively high cut off marks that is always being released by these schools.

As someone who is very conversant with the system, I would like to tell you that cut off marks for example; Medicine, are intentionally raised to the extent that those that become admitted using the cut off do not exceed 10 out of the expected 100 that are meant to be admitted. The remaining 90 are then admitted through back doors and connections.
That is when someone with 300+ jamb result would not get admitted while someone with 220 will be given admission.

Examples are the cut off marks recently released by Unilag and OAU, 81% and 79% for Medicine respectively. If you ask an insider well, he/she will tell you that those that score up to the mark are not more than 10 or thereabout.
Another example is the first admission list released by LAUTECH where only seven candidates who score up to the cut off mark were admitted for Medicine.

It is a pity that it has been like this for years, where more qualified candidates are denied admission because they are not well connected. This could also affect the quality of graduates that would be produced.

As a 200level Medical student, I would tell you that there are some of my colleagues who if things were done properly should not be in Medicine. Some of them would ask for the chemical formula of e.g; Sodium hydroxide. It is that barbaric.

I want to use this medium to appeal to all stakeholders in the education sector especially the NUC, to please for the sake of the masses who thrive to study hard despite various other challenges, to set out modalities and monitor those institutions on how our students, at least 80% would be admitted through a reasonable Merit cut off (and not the usual 10% or thereabout admitted through Merit caused by excessively high cut off marks) and the remaining 20% through connections since someone has said ruling the tradition out totally is impossible.

This will go far to create opportunity for the brilliant less privilege student, it will also bring about equality since as Nigerian citizens, we all own the facilities used in the training of our students.

Concocted lies. Medicine is quite competitive. I was position 78 during my time in the post UME, and was admitted without knowing anyone in federal University that is not in my state of origin.

Don't sell lies to Sound smart.

spiritedtete:


While I was in OAU addimission wasn't based on merit.... I can tell you that for sure.... 2000- 2006.. Do you know how many times I made cut off mark.... Do you know how many times I surpass my catchment area..

Funny thing is when list comes out.... 80% will score below you..
I remember when I have to use the influence of Oba olagbegi... Still it was late I was advised to wait another year.. Because the only place they could have me was eco-edu.

Do you know who helped me later... " A cleaner" an old woman. Who took me to fatukasi at the Senate building..

I can't forgive OUA for wasting my time honestly.... Forget the alma mater thing.. You will know that schooling in Nigeria is rubbish When go school abroad...

Like I said I'm not ruling out the fact that students may be admitted backdoor,do read my post again.OP came up with a stat of 10% merit which I'm not comfortable with.
2000-2006 I actually don't Know how transparent the admission process was then but
with the power of internet in this younger generation many can easily see the cutoff points and at same time relate the number of people who merit it or not.
I know of an older brother far north who did score 240+(early 2000) opted for medicine, although he seems to be a State hero and believe he wasn't admitted in Ife based on irregularities in the system.
That same score you will agree with me is not competitive enough and people hardly have access to cutoff Mark then as it is now, The summary is there may be other candidates who scored higher than him and based on merit quota of the University he never merit it.

Ujawissy:

Like I said I'm not ruling out the fact that students may be admitted backdoor,do read my post again.OP came up with a stat of 10% merit which I'm not comfortable with.
2000-2006 I actually don't Know how transparent the admission process was then but
with the power of internet in this younger generation many can easily see the cutoff points and at same time relate the number of people who merit it or not.
I know of an elder brother far north who did score 240+(early 2000) opted for medicine, although he seems to be a state hero and believe he wasn't admitted in Ife based on irregularities in the system.
That same score you will agree with me is not competitive enough and people hardly have access to cutoff Mark then as it is now, The summary is they may be other candidates who scored higher than him and based on merit quota of the University he never merit it.

To a large extent, getting in through the back door in UNILAG today can be really tough. Last year, some candidates resorted to upgrading their pume scores but meet the transparent system that affords everyone to see one another's score and aggregate. They were fished out and would never be admitted by the school again. It's tougher these days because everyone monitors everything.

writerights:


To a large extend, getting in through the back door in UNILAG today can be really tough. Last year, some candidates resorted to upgrading their pume scores but meet the transparent system that affords everyone to see one another's score and aggregate. They were dished out and would never be admitted by the school again. It's tougher these days because everyone monitors everything.

Exactly

writerights:

I hope you're not trying to absolve private universities of this blame because merit is not a list there.

What do you mean by this?

ABU Zaria is about 40% fair in her admission policy.

Ujawissy:

Like I said I'm not ruling out the fact that students may be admitted backdoor,do read my post again.OP came up with a stat of 10% merit which I'm not comfortable with.
2000-2006 I actually don't Know how transparent the admission process was then but
with the power of internet in this younger generation many can easily see the cutoff points and at same time relate the number of people who merit it or not.
I know of an older brother far north who did score 240+(early 2000) opted for medicine, although he seems to be a State hero and believe he wasn't admitted in Ife based on irregularities in the system.
That same score you will agree with me is not competitive enough and people hardly have access to cutoff Mark then as it is now, The summary is there may be other candidates who scored higher than him and based on merit quota of the University he never merit it.

That your elder bro... Wasn't just lucky back then like many.... He scored 240 right..... I knew someone who scored 210 for same course then and he got the addmission..

Addmission in Ife then was mostly based on discretion...

That of LAUTECH is particularly true. I did predegree and jamb, met the cut-off... When admission list came I was given Crop and Environmental protection in lieu of Medicine. It's so annoying when one sees people he is way better than getting into those courses.

When I went to the admissions office to complain, the admission officer asked me for my various scores which I told him. Since there wasn't anything else to prove I did not merit the admission, he asked what my state of origin was. I told him Ondo State. He said I could accept what I was given or go study Medicine in my Father's state.

Essentially, education in Nigeria is a huge joke.

HigherEd:

What do you mean by this?

There is no merit list there. Everyone is admitted on the discretion of the administrators. And everyone is eventually admitted.

genjb:
I would be talking about the process whereby aspirants are being admitted into our Federal and State Universities especially into competitive programs like Medicine, Law, Pharmacy, Dentistry, Nursing etc. Generally, it is required of aspirants to sit for the UTME and Post Utme examinations and those whose marks are up to the universities' released cut off marks are thus admitted.

Unfortunately, it has become a tradition that students who thrive to score high marks are being denied admission every year in most schools simply because of the excessively high cut off marks that is always being released by these schools.

As someone who is very conversant with the system, I would like to tell you that cut off marks for example; Medicine, are intentionally raised to the extent that those that become admitted using the cut off do not exceed 10 out of the expected 100 that are meant to be admitted. The remaining 90 are then admitted through back doors and connections.
That is when someone with 300+ jamb result would not get admitted while someone with 220 will be given admission.

Examples are the cut off marks recently released by Unilag and OAU, 81% and 79% for Medicine respectively. If you ask an insider well, he/she will tell you that those that score up to the mark are not more than 10 or thereabout.
Another example is the first admission list released by LAUTECH where only seven candidates who score up to the cut off mark were admitted for Medicine.

It is a pity that it has been like this for years, where more qualified candidates are denied admission because they are not well connected. This could also affect the quality of graduates that would be produced.

As a 200level Medical student, I would tell you that there are some of my colleagues who if things were done properly should not be in Medicine. Some of them would ask for the chemical formula of e.g; Sodium hydroxide. It is that barbaric.

I want to use this medium to appeal to all stakeholders in the education sector especially the NUC, to please for the sake of the masses who thrive to study hard despite various other challenges, to set out modalities and monitor those institutions on how our students, at least 80% would be admitted through a reasonable Merit cut off (and not the usual 10% or thereabout admitted through Merit caused by excessively high cut off marks) and the remaining 20% through connections since someone has said ruling the tradition out totally is impossible.

This will go far to create opportunity for the brilliant less privilege student, it will also bring about equality since as Nigerian citizens, we all own the facilities used in the training of our students.

OP, concerning the high cutoff marks for courses like Medicine, I have this to say.
I entered MBBS in Unilag in 2011. That year, 9000+ students applied for MBBS in Unilag. They admitted about 180. That's about 2%. It stands to reason that the top 2% would have quite high scores. And that if the school was to put a cutoff like maybe 65 or 70, the number of students they'd have to admit for medicine would be far more than they could train. Also note that usually, the students that go for MBBS are usually quite bright. So a cutoff like 76 - 80 is not out of place.
This year, 7000+ students applied for MBBS in Unilag, depending on the performance of these students and bearing in mind the fact that Unilag cannot train more than say 150 students, the cutoff mark would be expected to be quite high, hence 81. I know of someone who got 79 and won't get admission as she did not make the cutoff. It is quite painful but it is what it is.

I entered Unilag without knowing anybody, no connection at all. Most of my classmates entered the same way, either by merit or by catchment. Then the diploma students too.
Saying that people enter through the backdoor is very correct. However saying 10% enter as merit is very wrong, at least for Unilag. Those that worked their way into my class were in the very low minority.
One thing I know about my alma mater Unilag is that once you can make the cutoff, you're already a student.

rexbuton:
The writer and interested people could request for the UTME scores of candidates given Medicine and Law in the last 5years from select federal schools. The request would be made citing the FOI act. The findings would obviously be shocking, then we could have a senate hearing or move straight to court

I strongly seconded! we can all work out on the modalities that achieve fairness, equity in our own little way.

i agree dat back door admission is rampant. dis is smtin openly done in IFE

but saying 10% merit is utterly false..

courses like medicine law etc always hv abnormally high cut off..

i would say abt 80% merit nd 20% leg.. mind u dis ppl also score very close to cut off mark

except ure a president son.. u can't enter medicine with 50% u can fr law accnt engineering, but nt medicine.vc list in ife is nt determined by vc alone, alumni nd other important stakeholders hold a meeting in which d list will be drafted

d list will be determined by score too
student with long legs dat scored 50% might be given pharmacy or other high course like dat..

genjb:
.

smiles I think NUC should monitor it themselves cuz medicine in Lautech is now a family ties and not what you scored