The Senate last Thursday in Abuja directed the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB), to extend the validity of its results to a period of three years.
The question is, if this is implemented what are the possible implications?
One of the obvious implications is that candidates who scored up to the required UTME cut-off mark but were unable to secure admission in that academic year will still be able to use the result in the upcoming year thereby saving such candidates the stress of writing UTME again.
It will also reduce the financial burden on parents/guardians as the senate president, Bukola Saraki rightly pointed out.
However, the most critical is this; it will likely reduce the number of candidates applying for JAMB every year but at the same time increase the number of candidates seeking admission through UTME each year. This is not good considering that our tertiary institutions lack the capacity to accommodate the increasing number of admission seekers.
let's examine this. If the validity of UTME result gets extended, candidates who have obtained the required UTME cut-off mark for their course will need not apply for UTME in the upcoming year; however they will still join the teeming fresh secondary school leavers to jostle for admission in the following year. That will surely increase the number of admission seekers.
Now that seems to be nothing different from what it is at the moment; since some candidates who fail to gain admission last year, also sat for this year's UTME along side fresh secondary school leavers and are currently jostling for admission.
What you've failed to consider is that there are candidates who scored well above 200 in last year’s UTME, who were not admitted. Most of them participated in this year’s UTME but couldn’t score up to 180. This has automatically disqualified them for admission this year.
Now what if the validity of UTME result was implemented last year? That means they are still qualified to apply for admission this year there by increasing the number of admission seekers.
Also if the UTME result validity gets extended, many candidates with good UTME scores that fail to secure admission in a particular year will find it hard to consider programmes like diploma, IJMB, Pre-degree etc. since all they have to do is to wait another year and then re-apply for admission with their previous UTME result. The reason many opt for these other programmes in the first place is due to the stress of preparing and sitting for UTME over again.
So, if you ask me, I think admission quota for tertiary institutions should be increased first before extending the validity of UTME result or else the whole process will be self-defeating at the end of the day.
What's your own take on this and what are the other possible implications you can think of? Share with us.
