FG Makes Surprise U-Turn, Reduces Minimum Admission Age To 16 Years | The Legend News

This follows the backlash from stakeholders at the ongoing Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB) policy meeting.

Stakeholders and attendees at the ongoing policy meeting of the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB), had protested as the Minister of Education, Prof. Tahir Mamman, declared that only candidates who have attained the age of 18 would henceforth be given admission into tertiary institutions in the country.

The meeting also sets the tone for the year’s admission exercise and guidelines by which all institutions must admit students.

At the ongoing meeting, immediately after Mamman made the utterance saying only applicants who were 18 years and above were eligible for admission, the hall erupted in rowdiness.

In a move to calm frayed nerves, the Minister had asked, “Are we together?” to which the attendees chorused “No!”

It took the intervention of JAMB Registrar, Prof Ishaq Oloyede, before normalcy was restored.

While reacting to the grumblings from the participants, he insisted that the law required that their children should be in school at 18 years, having attended six years in primary school, three years in Junior Secondary School, and three years in senior secondary school.

The Minister noted that the meeting was to ensure that the process of admission for 2024/2024 was fair.

He said the position of the Federal Ministry of Education had not changed from any institution that does admission outside the right process, which is the Central Application Process (CAP).

But the minister later accepted the suggestions of the stakeholders that those from 16 years and above should be eligible for this year’s admission while the law would apply from next year.

However, he said this is just for the 2024 admissions and subsequently years 18 years will be the minimum age.

Also, JAMB sets minimum tolerance score for admissions into Universities at 140 and minimum score into Polytechnics and Colleges of Education at 100.

Ishaq Oloyede, JAMB’s Registrar noted that the scores are minimum tolerance and not cut-off marks, to avoid misunderstanding among candidates

Recall that the minister of education had in April said that the federal government would look into adopting 18 years as the minimum age for entry into tertiary institutions in the country.

The Senate Committee on Tertiary Institutions and Tetfund had also on April 23 said it would back the decision of the federal government to adopt 18 years as age limit for enrollment in tertiary institutions.

According to the FRCN report, “Muntari Dandutse, the committee chairman made this known when he led other members and the chairman, House of Representatives Committee on Education, to monitor the ongoing Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination, UTME in Abuja.”

Dandutse explained that having a minimum age limit for university education was necessary to maintain standards and ensure the students were ready for the task ahead.

He commended the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board for the smooth conduct of the examination so far and expressed the government’s commitment to improving the educational system.

The chairman of the Senate Committee on Tertiary Institutions and Tetfund advised the candidates to be focused and shun any act of malpractice during the examination.

Sunday Karimi, a member of the committee, representing Kogi West said the Senate would support any policy geared towards enhancing the education sector.

“The law is there, but if it means to check it and amend and make sure we have a robust law, we are going to do that,” Karimi said. Newsrain

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