The missing numbers in education metrics, By Zainab Suleiman Okino 

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Without all these metrics, anybody can make bogus claims. We cannot fix education if we do not measure it properly. Test scores are useful, but without real metrics or data behind them, education reforms amount to nothing because it would be like groping in the dark. We therefore need data-driven metrics not just to track students’ progress, but also admissions, available teaching staff and classrooms, and hostel accommodations.

At the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB) policy meeting last week, the Minister of Education, Tunji Alausa said Nigerian universities, polytechnics, and colleges of education are admitting thousands of students without checking whether they have anywhere to sleep.

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He gave an example of a polytechnic with a population of over 36,000 students and just about a 1,000-bed hostel accommodation. He therefore warned higher institutions to go by JAMB’s criteria, as set out in CAPS (Central Admissions Processing System), and not admit more than their quotas, in order to “protect the integrity of the system.”

Though that disturbing revelation should shake our confidence in our university education, and enrage us, we moved on as if all is well. Matter-of-factly, the minister should be stirred to action, as the chief superintendent in charge of education, now that he is in a vantage position to do so. But for many parents and students, it has been a familiar trend in our university system for decades.

A few weeks ago, a University of Nigeria, Nsukka student, in a viral video, exposed the level of dilapidation in the school with vivid footage of collapsed toilets, bathrooms in hostels that have obviously not been given a facelift or renovation in decades, blocked W/Cs, stinking conveniences, and tiled walls and floors in disrepair and about to collapse. In our premier university!

At the onset of last year’s admission exercise, my neighbour lamented about her son’s plight as a freshman in one of the federal universities in the North-Central, because the university’s accommodation administrators gave the young undergraduate a hostel room without a door or window. He was still considered lucky to have gotten a room.

This is typical of almost all the public universities in the country, such that we are numbed to things that matter, things that should jolt us to action, and true reforms. Instead, and for political considerations, the government would rather establish more universities than expand the old ones, upgrade and build new infrastructure, and modernise existing facilities.

And for university administrators, their concern is often more about intangible things. In the last seven years, I have watched the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board, at each policy meeting, complain, warn, and caution against admitting students outside CAPS. The fact of its repetition shows the impunity of university administrators and their flagrant disregard for the rules and guidelines governing admissions processes.

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…admission numbers should be tied to many other variables such as teacher-to-student ratios, verified accommodation spaces, and classroom capacity, not just academic demand. Every institution should release annual updates on teacher-student ratios, hostel capacity, occupancy rates, and average off-campus rent within five kilometres of campus. 

Under Professor Ishaq Oloyede as Registrar, JAMB has witnessed many reforms and guidelines, including CAPS, an online platform that automates the entire admission process into tertiary institutions, and CBT exams, all of which have helped reposition JAMB as a foremost and credible examination body in Nigeria.

I have witnessed education eggheads disagree over “minimum cut-off marks” and, in the process, downgrade institutions they should build, transform, and project to the world. Often, Vice Chancellors, Rectors, and Provosts decide and vote on their minimum marks for admission, and consistently what happens is a diminishing standard. For this year, the minimum mark for admission into universities is put at 150 out of 400 marks. That is 37.5 per cent, which in any sane environment is considered a fail.

Yet, that was the consensus minimum mark agreed to by our university administrators. Note, though, that individual universities still have their own minimum marks already submitted to JAMB, and some do not go below 200 marks.

Imagine someone studying Medicine without biology or engineering without mathematics. These are problems CAPS attempts to correct, and going against it signals fraud. According to the JAMB Registrar, “findings indicate that under-the-table admissions are partly driven by low quota for regulated programmes.”

He also observed that “high-scoring PUTME candidates are encouraged to change programmes to create opportunities for under-performing candidates,” while admonishing against fake examination slip syndicates, such as the bogus score of 395 out of 400 marks submitted by a candidate seeking admission to a university in Cameroon, until that university sought clearance from JAMB.

Recall the controversy over the entry age of prospective candidates to universities, and the unanimous decision that put it at 18, with the exception of exceptional candidates who can be admitted at 16. According to Professor Oloyede, last year, 41,027 candidates indicated they belonged to that group, but at the end of the series of exercises conducted for them, only 85 qualified and were admitted.

Dr Alausa’s naming of a major gap that is hardly talked about could be the beginning of measuring what actually matters in the pursuit of knowledge beyond academics. And coming from a minister in charge of education, he should not stop at the level of exposé. The minister should walk the talk and ensure all requirements of higher institutions are data-driven.

Without all these metrics, anybody can make bogus claims. We cannot fix education if we do not measure it properly. Test scores are useful, but without real metrics or data behind them, education reforms amount to nothing because it would be like groping in the dark. We therefore need data-driven metrics not just to track students’ progress, but also admissions, available teaching staff and classrooms, and hostel accommodations.

Data details can expose a bigger problem. We have built an admissions system that is great at counting applicants but terrible at measuring readiness. Every year, institutions announce record intakes as a sign of progress. But progress without capacity is not progress.

Students who cannot find space pay inflated rents in towns not built for them, or commute for hours daily across bad roads. Study time erodes. Health suffers. Dropout risk rises. And all of this happens after we have told these young people they have “gained admission.”

This is what happens when policy runs on the wrong metrics. JAMB tracks applications, minimum marks, and placements with precision, but there are no policy backups and no public, standardised data on student-to-teacher, bed-to-student ratios, off-campus housing supply, or the cost of accommodation relative to student income. The system tracks who gets in, but not whether it can support them once they are there. Meanwhile, data-driven education metrics could change the conversation.

Therefore, admission numbers should be tied to many other variables such as teacher-to-student ratios, verified accommodation spaces, and classroom capacity, not just academic demand. Every institution should release annual updates on teacher-student ratios, hostel capacity, occupancy rates, and average off-campus rent within five kilometres of campus. Since JAMB has proven its capacity over the years, its system can be adapted to flag institutions where necessary facilities fall below a set threshold, giving students and parents real information before choices are made.

Countries that have scaled higher education without collapsing quality did so by treating these metrics as part of the admission equation, not as an afterthought. Dr Alausa’s naming of a major gap that is hardly talked about could be the beginning of measuring what actually matters in the pursuit of knowledge beyond academics. And coming from a minister in charge of education, he should not stop at the level of exposé. The minister should walk the talk and ensure all requirements of higher institutions are data-driven.

Zainab Suleiman Okino (FNGE), chairs the Blueprint Editorial Board. She is a syndicated columnist and can be reached via: [email protected]