₦airaland Forum

You are right about that. I don't know how I will cope yet when ordinary air conditioner freezes me.

thanks so much obowunmi. I will be going to Hamilton College, New York. i don't know if it is safe to post my email here sha. if i figure out a way to post and then remove it i will.

yeah I've been thinking of study abroad, but i've got to be careful so that I don't choose to go to someplace like Japan and then a tsunami knocks the life out of me.

thanks again.

obowunmi:
^^^
2. You must come prepared to have 4/5 exams in one week.

thanks so much. that is gonna be tough. I've got campus employment as part of my finaid package, pls do you think I can combine a 20 hour work week with 4/5 exams per week?

obowunmi:
3. Be very nice to professors/ TA's because often times grading can be subjective -- you'd be surprised as to how many girls "date" or sleep with their professors for grades

that reminds me, is it true that professors/TA's want to be addressed by their first names. You know, here in Naija, no student would dare that.

obowunmi:
4. Go after all and any scholarships you can take advantage of whether or not u're a citizen, resident, or visiting student.

will do.

obowunmi:
5. If you are not planning to go back to Nigeria, wisely befriend a gal for papers,  (pay her or marry her, which ever one) cause there is nothing more painful than finishing your degree and NOT being able to find work, especially if you do not plan to go back to Nigeria. 

I love Nigeria and even if I don't find work on return, which I know is very possible, I know a guy who went to Columbia who is still searching for a position here in Naija, I will strike out on my own. I don't know if its possible to ignore the ladies as I did during my secondary school. I would love to in order to avoid the distractions. Any tips on politely saying no if disturbed?

well obowunmi, i'm neither tall nor handsome, so I guess i'll be spared. but you mentioned doing well in school. I've had all my education in Nigeria, and if what I hear is anything to go by, the demands on students there are kinda stringent. so what specific tips would you give that would help me do well in school. thank you very much.

pleep:
are you a female?

No i'm not. I just happen to be uninterested in the whole chase game by virtue of the way I was raised and my own observations. I feel its not worth it except when i'm ready to get married.

thank you very much obowunmi. I have no interest in drugs or liquor and neither do I chase. However, I may have difficulty if chased. One of my advisors warned that I could be chased. Is that true?

I will be going to the US for my undergraduate education. I know that many Nigerians here on NL have studied or are currently studying in US institutions. I would like some tips on how to survive and thrive. Thanks for your contributions in advance.

fstranger1:
^^^

Despite, we have produced a Nobel prize winner, produced Emeagwali, produced Nnaji, produced Okonjo Iweala and her husband, produced Chinua Achebe, produced lots and lots of professionals plying their trade in America including yours truly.

You can say whatever you want about Nigeria, until you get off you sorry azz and do something, you are just as guilty as the people you deride and criticize. Life must be really difficult for you. Sorry you went through a bad childhood.

Some of us had the best education in Nigeria and we would not trade it for anything American.

I'm just wondering, is it totally right to say we have produced those guys? Are you sure these guys would be who they are now if they had not left Nigeria? If Nigeria was so good, why did they have to leave? Could it be because something was/is lacking?

Okay, can we think of any American or European who, lets say went to high school in his country, then moved to Nigeria and became as big as these guys?

It seems you have a problem with someone on this thread and while I don't want to get into it, I'm just wondering, what are you yourself doing about Nigeria?

I'm happy you had the best education in Nigeria. I can assure you that you are most likely an exception or that the percentage of people who truly feel the way you do about their Nigerian education is rather low. So while you were among the fortunate, the majority of Nigerians are not in your shoes and that's why we even have this thread going on, I believe.

Natasha,,:
who told you it doesn't make sense? it depends i.e some one who wants to study a course like law should be an intelligent thinker with a very good sense of reasoning and posse

Yes, this was the reason I was given and that is why I read arts in secondary school. However, looking back, I think I agree with Chiogo.

However, I have to assure you that the assertion in the italicized part below is not necessarily the case, the 'science' students are not necessarily more serious than the arts students. I know because I just got out of high school not too long ago. And you are wrong when you say that most students are not thinking of going on to university. Nigeria's labour market is extremely certificate crazy, I know because I tried to get work once out of high school(i didn't want to go to any govt. run university because they are not much different from the high schools) and found that a high school leaver can hardly get a decent job, something my parents assure me was not the case in their time. So please get rid of the idea that most Nigerian students don't want to go to university.

tensor777:
Anyway most of these students are not thinking of going on to university. The whole point of taking these subjects is just to negotiate the school system with the minimum of stress and aggro.
Be that as it may, I think the optional system backfired since as I say most students take the easy way out. Even more importantly the system DOES NEED to produce much more scientists and technicians than it is currently producing. So basically by eschewing subjects like physics and chemistry these students are being constrained in their choice of career after high school.

However I agree with you that limiting my scope by studying arts was not a good idea. For one, if I a science student has easier mobility and can one day wake up and decide he wants to read law and do so simply by reading the required texts in goverment, commerce and whatever else is needed. I for a person originally thought I wanted to study Law, but not any longer. I now want to study computing, something I've fallen crazily in love with, and have to spend a lot of time learning science stuff I should/could have learned in high school if the curriculum was more like the American curriculum.


After much thinking, I must say though that the problem does not start in secondary school. It starts at primary school. I recently had to learn more about the American Educational system, and the things Americans are taught in primary school, its incredible. The access to facilities, labs, etc its just wonderful. I'm not saying every American kid is this fortunate or that the American system is perfect, no system is.

I'm not trying to excuse secondary schools in Nigeria, just pointing out that the secondary schools are part of a terrible mess of poor education starting from primary and running up to the tertiary institutions. If i were to have kids, I would homeschool them and model their education on the American k12 system.

Jenifa_:
and the thing about expo/ cheating, it should be common sense that that is the result of lack of law enforcement. cheating will always exist yes. but the rate shouldn't be too high if an efficient system is in place.
in fact, when I took primary school common entrance exam, the moderators were reading the answers aloud to us!! talk about blame the system. by secondary school, level of moral was -100% people were leaving school by jumping over fences, cheating in exams were taken for granted. kinda like paying bribe at the airport. when there is no proper system in place, chaos will be the order of the day.

I think you have hit the nail on the head. The will to curtail cheating just isn't there! Take the SAT for example, is an example of an exam that it's pretty hard to cheat on. So many Nigerians get high scores in WASSCE but thier SAT scores are not what you would expect from guys with such scores. Yet Nigerians are so cheat crazy that they tried cheating on one recently conducted in Lagos. Well, the Collegeboard canceled the test because they detected cheating using technology (http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/28/education/28cheat.html?_r=1) . Its as simple as that. Agreed innocents may be hurt every now and then, but certainly, after a while, I guess the cheaters will give up when they are repeatedly caught cheating, especially if the 21 years recommended punishment is actually implemented.

This question is important. I'd really like to know the answers. For one, even though I don't chase, if I had the time or interest, it would be because they are attractive.

Sagamite:
You are daft!

Try and speak facts and stop making up unsubstantiated rules like a simpleton.

Thank you.

Despite being daft and a simpleton, I am grateful that I can still understand and apply simple forum rules as stated here: https://www.nairaland.com/nigeria/topic-1026.0.html.

NO PERSONAL ATTACKS OR PUBLIC FIGHTS
Nairaland is a discussion forum, and it is inevitable that disagreements with crop up from time to time. Please be nice and respectful to other members at all times and do not resort to personal attacks, false accusations, name-calling, and other unproductive forms of communication. If you are upset with another member of the forum you must settle the fight outside the forum. You must not carry out any 'fights' on the open forum. 'Fights' are not allowed.

Some would expect that you would demonstrate your intelligence by following clear regulations.

While I will not enter into the argument, it really is none of my business, I would like to state that this is one thing that is really irritating in some men. The inability to argue or hold different opinions without resorting to abusive language. In certain intellectual circles the dependence on terms such as "fool", "not-so-smart person", "|diot", "moronic" etc will so turn off folks that even if your point is valid they will ignore you.

John F Kennedy said: "Civility is not a sign of weakness, ". It is not too difficult to keep arguments and conversations civil and conduct oneself in a manner that shows maturity. What example are adults who speak like this setting for teens like me? Truly Intelligent people will see no need to resort to insults when trying to prove their point.

I tend to agree with eku_bear. After investigating US education, I find it to be very rewarding for the student. I believe it would be a good idea to model after their system. Copying someone is not as terrible as some of us would make it seem.The fact remains that we all copy people at one point in time of our lives. The time and expense involved in fashioning out a special new curriculum is not reasonable. Worse it is the perfect avenue for more corruption. If at all, that effort should be spent only on certain things like Nigerian History and Government. It is important to have a good idea of the History of one's nation and that is something the Americans do not joke with.

Trying to educate kids in their native language sounds very good on paper but in practice, the cost would probably be mind boggling. Don't forget you would have to educate a new crop of teachers to teach in the native language, new textbooks written in native language, I mean, I don't even want to think about it. And let us not forget that English is the language of the world - in technical, scientific and similar journals.

A lot of people have cited China and other countries as using the native language. That is true. But it may surprise you to learn that a lot of those students are also whiz kids at English! They learn English concurrently with whatever they may be learning in their native language. Asians do best on the SAT, even in the Critical Reading and Writing portions of it. Math has always been their strong suit.

So the idea of teaching in the native language is not a bad idea - but if at all, it should be done very very gradually and you also need to be sure that change in government will not lead to the idea being scrapped. On the whole, it seems fraught with more challenges than just adapting what works already.

Nigerian education faces several challenges. Many have been mentioned. I'll talk about a few.

As a student just out of high school, I can recall that several of my peers spent very little time reading or studying. I'm not trying to boast but I did spend a lot of time studying and that is because I loved studying and learning and discovering new things. A lot of my mates viewed the learning part of school as boring- I still don't know exactly why. What was interesting was break time, sports period, and everything else but classes. So I think that the lack of Intrinsic motivation on the part of most students is a huge factor. I seriously think that not every student should go to high school. I may sound harsh or unfair but the truth is that several of my mates would have been better off learning something practical that they could pursue and actually excel at. The years they spent in high school were kinda wasted - that is my take.

But the problem is that everyone wants his child to go to high school, and then University, whether the child has the aptitude or not. As someone has pointed earlier on, I think that a lot of people would bring a high level of seriousness to their education if they first went out into the world and saw how limiting the lack of good education was. That could perhaps motivate them to strive for excellence. A Law Lecturer in the University of Uyo, who is a friend, never went to secondary school. He went through the external GCE route and did very well. Eventually he is where he is because he knew what he wanted and was ready to pay his dues. Too many of my mates do not know what they want or are not ready to work hard at it. This attitude is fostered by our society. When people with mediocre ability get into top positions the message is crystal clear- hard work does not pay.

Another problem is cheating. The knowledge that cheating is acceptable. I am afraid that most people who decry cheating are only paying lip service. If the government and schools want to stop cheating, trust me, they know what to do. I was a good student at my school, not exceptional, but good. I recall that my Senior Mistress Academics walked up to me before a final exam and reminded me that I should try and help my colleagues in the exam hall. Of course I agreed wholeheartedly but I was full of disgust. I spend my nights reading and poring over long notes and you expect me to come and share it with those who only rushed to the phonebooth last night to purchase the expo? Crazy! Parents, teachers, education ministry workers are all involved in the cheating game. At first it baffled me but I now realize that a lot of parents, teachers and others cheated as well and therefore see it as no big deal. Until we are serious about cheating nothing will improve. I recall trying to convince my mates that cheating was not a good idea. I thought up an illustration. I told them, how would you feel if you had a kid and your kid was injured. You took him to the hospital and lo and behold, the Doctor or Surgeon or whatever is your classmate whom you know both of you cheated your way through high school. How comfortable would you feel entrusting your child to him? They couldn't answer. But that didn't change anything. One ventured to say that he knew cheating was bad. But that he was going to stop right after the WASSCE exam. How ironic. WASSCE and the exams he will have to take in the university, which is harder?

Faculty. Trust me, I went to a school that wins several competitions and does well, although a public school. Often our teachers were praised as being very wonderful. In truth, many of our teachers were terrible. Some were really good but most were not that good. A lot of us who represented our schools at competitions had external help either from private tutors or our parents or personal research. Like the guy who always represented my school in math competitions, his father was a solid Further mathematics graduate. So his father always drilled him in math. I love the English Language, I've been around literature ever before I was born so I was the logical choice for English Competitions. But I got where I got through concerted study. My father would drill me in English using First Aid in English and other great tools. I must say that left to our school faculty alone, my friend and I would not be the lethal combination we were while in high school.

Facilities: My school is a public school in the heart of Abuja. But we have lacked adequate facilities since creation. Biology, Physics, Chemistry are all courses that could really come alive if we had proper labs. But given the unavailability of these it is not hard to understand why so many students do poorly. Having the time to play around in the labs will help to solidify concepts and help those students not so good at abstraction.

Curriculum: I did well at school, but trust me, I hated a lot of what I was learning. It was just too abstract. The curriculum need more practicum in it. It needs to be adjusted to suit real life. And most of all, teachers need to show the connections between what is taught and life, between one subject and another. I did bad in certain math topics because I had a hard time understanding for instance, how circle theory will help me in my day to day life. But I could readily appreciate how arithmetic and geometric progression or probability is applicable to real life situations.  Then don't even get me started on note copying. Our teachers seem to believe, for some reason, that making students human photocopying machines is a good idea, is somewhat making them intellectuals. Nothing could be more flawed. I refused to write JAMB after high school, I still have not written it, because I cannot bear to think of continuing that misery in University. Copying notes in this century?!! We should be making notes not copying the textbook word for word when we could as well open it up and read. The students hardly have interest in reading and then you lessen their time for it by making them copy the textbook. It is crazy. I'd rather be a waiter than copy notes again. When I finished my NECO I swore that I would never copy notes again.

That's just a little of what is wrong. There is a lot more where that came from. As someone who has just finished high school, I know a lot about what is not working. I am saddened each time I meet a classmate and I hear him say how he has had to enroll at another secondary school to try to resit the WASSCE so that he can get enough credits to get into a university. Why graduate him in the first place? Why is he bothering with the university? The truth is he is not ready yet. But I can't tell him that because then it will look like I am trying to stop someones progress. But high school or University is not for everyone. Until we admit that truth we will have terrible failure rates.

1) For those who have some experience with WAEC and western education, ow hard is the WAEC exam, say compared to the some of the US High School exit exams or the SAT?
2) What were the pass rates and # of students taking the exam over the past 10-20 years?
3) How are other WAEC countries (I guess Ghana, etc) doing?
4) What is the penalty for failing WAEC? Do you not get your HS diploma?

I haven't taken US High School exit exams because I schooled here in Nigeria but I can assure you that the WASSCE to a large extent is not comparable to the SAT. I took the SAT last year and I did okay. The funny thing is that a lot of my mates who had stunning scores on the WASSCE did terribly on the SAT because the scores they had on their WASSCE were from cheating. You are safer comparing the WASSCE exam to SAT Subject Tests in different subjects,e.g Physics, Mathematics Level 1 and 2, Biology etc.

I don't know the answer to question 2 or 3.

As for high school diploma that is neither here nor there as the most a totally failed student would get is a school testimonial attesting to his character and ability.

True.

Nigerians tend to do less well in the SAT and better in cramming exams.

So true and I think it is a shame. Cramming does not show mastery of the subject as far as I am concerned. I had a Biology teacher in ss3 who showed the importance of true understanding. His tests were always application based. Apply your understanding to solve the question, don't regurgitate crammed facts. That is one of the greatest problems of Nigerian education-emphasis on cramming.

It all depends on the individual. Also Nigerian WAEC exams are very straight forward- you have to cram for the exam and do past questions.

True again.

All the people here blowing grammar, as long as they schooled in nigeria cheated for WAEC. Dont worry they cheat in the US too- just better than Nigerians.

I am surprised that you should be saying this because you sound far more educated than to be making generalizations as 'silly' (forgive my use of this term but I just couldn't help it) as this.I am very proud to state that I didn't cheat on my high school exams. Did you cheat? Are you trying to justify that?

Infact these 79.6% are a shame. They cheated and still failed. Thats like ridiculous

Yep, thats true.

And about the organisation you talked about, one such still exists. In fact it is that organisation that found me, paid for my SAT, TOEFL, etc and is helping me navigate the college admissions process.

i'l try to get the new resolution. i have been quiet because I have been using windows 7 exclusively for the past 3 months because of my job. But i miss me dear ubuntu.

As a lot of people have said a dad has s right to go through his child's phone, son or daughter. In my house, and i recognise this is not the typical naija house, i can go through both my dads and my moms phones and vice versa. We have nothing to hide from each other and a high level of trust. Although I have a password on my phone anyway because of annoying friends who would like to save names such as darling, hotchick etc, you get the picture in my phonebook and then send erotic or off-sounding texts to my number in the hopes of getting me into trouble.

in any case, my folks have the password and if a text message or anything comes in, they can always check it. this has been very useful in several instances when i forget my phone at home and someone sends me some important info, my folks can always tell me whats up when i call them to ask if i have received a message or something.

however, my dad and mom never pick up my phone in my absence, at least i've never seen them do it. that's what trust does. My parents feel that , children have a right to privacy commensurate with their level of maturity but that they have both the God-given authority and the responsibility to train and supervise me. They equally ensure that I recognize their concern, not as a needless intrusion, but as an expression of unselfish love which as many have said is what your Dad has for you. That said, if I were him I wouldn't do what he did because that is not the example i have received from my own Dad. If I want to see my child's phone, I would simply ask. Going by your posts, i'm pretty sure that if your Dad asked you to browse through your phone, you'll have no problem giving it to him. To me, I just feel that if you truly trust someone you don't need to do anything behind the persons back. But of course that trust has to be earned over years of association.

The truth is, depending on the kid, parental surveillance would be useless. I for example am so techy that I would simply frustrate my parents were they to attempt to monitor me without my consent and I discovered. But I realize what they are doing is for my own good, not any other persons so I don't mind - i've been saved a lot by that stand. Its good that you're not so pissed off anymore by his actions - and if you are bold enough and you are sure that it would not lead to unfair repercussions, you may try bringing up the topic with him, i have found that letting my parents know how I feel, albeit always in a very respectful manner and not when i am angry has helped me loosen some of those boundaries parents are ever so inclined to impose.

hi all, im fed up with network manager. please can you suggest an alternative tool for managing my network cards. i've got 3 on my system and i use all of them.

I can't help you with fortran, if you were asking me. i'm truly sorry about that. and i am by no means a sir.

the guys that are interested in programming should contact me at michaelisaac {at) clicknigeria dot com. i'm not a proffessional programmer, i'm just learning but I have the advantage of a mentor, my senior brother is a programmer. I started learning this month since and i find it interesting. But I would love to work with other young programmers, I am under 20 and I believe that if we form a community, we could be really helpful to each other. What do you guys think?

I want to contribute some posts to ubuntu nigeria. wats the procedure?

yeah, muyiscoi, i only need the antivirus for windows guys. you know, guys come to the cafe i manage and they bring their terrible flashes, and as a value add service, they ask me to scan the virusified flashes for them.

major factor in my moving my cafe from windows to linux was to avoid viruses. hey, take your time on the tutorial. don't need it right now. I wish i had something to post on like you though. im envious.

thanks dsunmade. will try out avast. Muyiscoll, that sounds like interesting stuff to do. maybe u should write a tutorial about it, someone may need something like it in the future.

im searching for an antivirus for my ubuntu? any recommendations?

congrats dsunmade. and thanks for posting ur success here. hopefully, someday, someguy will make use of it.

yeah, i know i don't have to upgrade everytime, its just that usually, the browser upgrades are security upgrades so thats why i want to cut down to just 1.

if you have a working and tweaked distro, i wonder why you would just want to abandon it for "gnome3". I believe in, if its working, don't fix it. Why? After years of fixing perfectly working things, and then those things go wrong just after my "fix", i have begun to see reason in leaving things the way there are as long as there is no vulnerability issue involved.

i like chromium, and i think i will stay wit it. but i also like a lot of mozilla's addons.

next question? do you guys use firewalls for your linux pc's? Which would you recommend? Please leave firestarter out of the recommendations. I currently have ufw as a frontend, but don't really understand it yet, sha. Im still suffering from windows style laziness. You know, you don't really have to read documentation in windows. you just install it and forget abt and it pretends to be working even if it isn't.

Muyiscol, i too read "Dr. Luv"'s suggestion, but i think that idea would be a bit difficult to implement. But who knows, maybe we could stand up to the challenge. How? is the question. Anyway, in my daily activity, i preach the linux gospel like a Jehovah's Witness. My bros, who is a pure windows guy is even irritated. but i can't stop preaching about the things i have seen, used and benefited immensely from.

Hi guys, just wondering, what are your browser recommendations? I have both
Chromium and Mozilla but i want to get rid of one of them cos i can't keep seeing my bandwidth fizzle away because both Mozilla and Chromium have security updates.

The annoying part is that when i download chromium on one pc, and try to use aptoncd to install it on my other pc's it refuses to install.

So, know, which do i keep, mozilla or chromium?

thanks 4llerbuntu. wasn't very clear in my post.

how come u keep getting headers , 21, are u sure its , 21 all the time?

i didn't mean that i keep getting that over and over. i just mean that i got 21, then 22, then 23, currently its 24. each time the kernel download size is about 30 mb. having to download that much on my personal connection is annoying.

why don't they just issue a patch to the kernel, why do the have to send an entire new kernel each time? if all my hardware are correctly recognised by existing kernel, do i still need to upgrade each time a kernel revision comes alive?

okay, i just checked my update manager know, i have 75 mb of updates to download! kai!

anyway, there is not much i can do about it. so i guess i just have to live with it.

yeah, i've been to the site and have the facebook/twitter page. good to see we are really serious about this.

by the way, i solved my bandwidth problem using webmin. webmin is an all round sysadmin software not just bandwidth, a bit of an overkill but i like it.

im just wondering about this stuff: linux-headers-2.6.32-21 linux-headers-2.6.32-21-generic. they keep coming up in my updates. and im losing my precious bandwidth to installing them. i now have up to linux-headers-2.6.32-24 linux-headers-2.6.32-24-generic its annoying.

ubuntu updates more often than any other os i have used. do i have to update every time?

well, 4llerbuntu, i use mkahawa as a cafe manager software. its open source. hope you remember to share some of the money you make from deploying it with me.@black weaver i tried to use kppp but i keep getting this no carrier shit from it. i don't know, maybe i should remove network manager and wvdial before using it. and then wvdial, keeps telling me stories about permissions, it seems it wants me to run it as root b it works.

thats by the side, even when i run it as root, and it connects im unable to browse with it. sucks really but network manager has no problem connecting me and browsing. my problem with it is that it does not keep logs so once the connection is off, i don't know how much bandwidth i've used.

now there is this interesting program,vodafone 3g mobile connect for linux. it's great only thing is that it does not detect my modem and i have to do some programming to get it to detect my modem so thats on pause. i have a lot of more pressing things im doing than that. actually, i don't know how to program so to program it will mean i hav to learn programming or get a programmer to do it.

anyway, i don't use mint cos em, i don't think i need to waste my bandwidth downloading another os, when i already have ubuntu. and no i dont use a theme that looks like windows only. its more than that. if you use my pimped pc, you could actually be deceived that ur using windows 7.

and 4ellerbuntu, im having trouble with my isp o! which one do you recommend for cafe thats fast and reliable. im in abuja.

and about pple hating linux, well it's just really annoying cos using linux would have made life much easier for them. like you said, drivers and stuff working out of the box.

i think windows also dumbs people down a bit. and one of the places where pple could get introduced to linux is cafe's but those guys insist on using 300 naira windows and reinstalling as many times as thier pc's crash.

schools also insist on using windows when they could be spending their budget on something far better, that is , if they are using properly licensed windows.

at least, our pple should know that they have an option and windows isn't the only way.

i run a cafe and i use ubuntu on my pc's. but just to make the pple comfortable, i had to install some stuff that makes the gnome desktop look like windows 7. i feel bad about it, but if i am to keep my job, i must otherwise oga go sack me.