The Joint Admission and Matriculation Board (JAMB) has extended registration for the Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME) from February 2 to March 4, 2012.

The Public Relations Officer of JAMB, Mr. Timothy Adedeji, told LEADERSHIP on phone that the shift was to give students the chance to conclude their registration without any hitches.

The examination, according to him, would take place on March 24, 2012.

In a chat with some of the candidates for the examination, it was gathered that some of the literature books recommended by JAMB is not well circulated. The books, ‘Potter’s Wheel’ and ‘Successor’ is very scarce to get. A student who did not want his name mentioned urged JAMB to do something before the examination time.

LEADERSHIP also learnt that, for the first time, JAMB would be providing writing materials for the candidates, such as? calculators, pencil, eraser, among others.

After the meeting between Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) and the Federal Government yesterday there are indications? that the strike action embarked by ASUU for almost two months might not be coming to an end as anticipated by Nigerians.??

ASUU President, Professor Ukachukwu after emerging from the meeting said, “we have discussed. We have looked at the issues. Government has made its offer. And I have to take it to my principal.”

When asked, when ASUU National Executive Council(NEC) meeting would hold to discuss the matter, Awuzie said, “I said I have to take it to my principal. I will do everything possible to meet my principal soonest.”

They have laid their cards on the table, and I have to take it to my principal. They have done their best within what they think is available by the Government. Because we are all Nigerians, we didn’t go into it just to soil the system.

“So, we have listened to them. They have made the offers.

They have told us why they took certain decision and why they didn’t take some. We are going to take it to our principal. And of course you know for the first time we have been able to get this far, seeing the seriousness of government by taking it to the level of the Secretary to the Government of the Federation.

The minister of education has made it clear that teaching and vocational training will be paramount in this year’s budget and this is because it has been observed that the profession has suffered immensely compared to others in the country. In this quest, will the present administration look into the roles played by female teachers as well as their inadequacy in the profession? Kuni Tyessi takes a look at it.

One of the challenges of contemporary society and the educational system is to address gender inequality in the educational social systems so that schools and teachers at all levels can have a key role to play in developing a gender-sensitive future generation. Gender stereotypes exist in all human societies and in all human endeavours.

Some scholars interchange the word gender for sex to create the erroneous impression that certain barriers to progress are a matter of nature, whereas they are manifestation of nurture socially constructed and therefore subject to change.

Others say gender stereotype is one type of subjective perception of what a man or woman should be or how people should behave. Most of these stereotypes often described men as intellectually competent, strong and brave, while women are homely, warm and expressive, incompetent and passive. They portray the male as strong, dominant person with leadership trait, one whose works should be outside the home in often prestigious occupations, while female is usually portrayed as being subordinate and confined to the home.

Nigerian women, generally, are yet to occupy their positions on the Nigerian educational set-up.the wide gap between the male and female has existed over the years and deliberate efforts have been made by the united nation to address it. These efforts include declaration of a decade for women, which culminated in the Beijing conference of 1995, Education For All, EFA, Millennium Development Goals, MDGs, Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination Against Women, CEDAW, etc.

These all criticize the unequal treatment between sexes and the stereotyped way of teaching in the educational system, teaching staff and standards, the elimination of stereotyped concepts of the role of women and men, the same opportunity for scholarships, the same access for continuing education, sports and physical education.

Like their counterparts in other parts of Africa, available statistics indicate that Nigerian women are yet to occupy their rightful places in various sectors of the Nigerian education industry. The level of female participation in Nigerian secondary school education is far lower than that at the primary education level. It appears that the higher the education ladder, the lower the level of female involvement.

According to TRCN statistical digest for 2008, there are 110,923 male teachers and 94, 365 female teachers in the secondary schools in all the 36 states of the federation including Abuja, the Federal capital territory. However, by 2009, the statistics indicate that there are 121,750 male teachers and 125, 801 female teachers which is a substantial improvement from the 2008 statistics.

Already, it has been established that culture and tradition seem to be the reason why Nigerian women are underrepresented in various sectors of the Nigerian labour force, which is just one of the surviving legacies of a traditional educational background that saw housekeeping as the exclusive career of women.

However, current data are subtle proofs that Nigerian women are gradually pulling down the traditional barriers militating against their adequate participation in the education industry. The pulling down process is however slow largely because the force of tradition often takes time to break.

The norms of most Nigerian societies are too male oriented. Even school traditions many times discriminate against women’s education, as many text books are full of materials that reinforce gender discrimination and sex stereotyping. The career development of women is often tailored along specific occupations traditionally stereotyped as female occupation. Some teachers do not even have often like investing time on female pupils believing that most of them will sooner or later end up in marriage.

These diverse constraints to women education has its attendant effect on the teaching profession right from the training of a child in the classroom and the various behaviors of teachers to the pupils which culminate in the choice of career that the female child chooses.

With these in mind, one can say that the reason might not be far-fetched as it is known that the teaching job is laced with too many controversies and chiefly among them is the low remuneration which has enabled many to say that the reward of teachers is in heaven. If their reward is in heaven, then it is even a worse case for the woman as she is known to suffer double oppression from the society and the home front.

Anambra State has been in the news concerning the low level of the enrolment of male teachers and the reason given is that they are business inclined and need to make all the monies in the world as the meager salaries of the teaching profession cannot see to their needs and that of their families and as such, it must be a profession for women whom it is said do not need so much in term of cash because they are meant to be provided for.

However, research has revealed that the uneducated men at the long run get married to the educated females who in the long run begin to fill that there is a social imbalance as they cannot proudly introduce them to others and even in constructive discussions, there usually seems to be no melting point for the two thereby endangering the marriage institution and giving cause for concern for the most noble yet under paid profession.

As part of modalities to checkmate the spate of examination failure, especially in NECO, WAEC and JAMB, forced career choices made by parents on their children have been identified as a major root cause.

This was disclosed by the chief executive secretary of NABTEB, Dr Olatunde Aworanti during his presentation at the national examination summit held in Abuja. He said the attitude of many parents has not helped the education sector in terms of quality results.

He accused parents of forcing their children to read professional courses like medicine, architecture, engineering and law, among several others without taking into cognizance the abilities and level of assimilation of the children which he said pose a detriment to the child.

He advised parents to allow their children to choose courses by themselves and the subject combination to facilitate such, revealing that with hard work, dedication and perseverance, each child could make it to the top if given the opportunity.

He said that already, there has been a misconception of technical schools which has also grossly affected the performance of many who see it as a second option or last resort. He disclosed that in a subject like motor vehicles mechanical works, statistics showed that 63.4%. 56.6%, 37.1%, 85.5% and 81.4% failed in 2007, 2008, 2009 and 2010 respectively.

He posited that other factors responsible for examination failure include inadequate coverage of syllabus and non-familiarity with test format foundation factors, poor reading culture, wrong subject combination, and lack of common knowledge of common pitfalls.

Others which were further subdivided are institutional, environmental/structural, societal, psycho-social, home/parental, as well as teachers and students factors.

The Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board, JAMB, has dissociated itself from an unauthorized text message which had been in circulation and is aimed at misleading and defrauding unsuspecting members of the public.

The registrar and chief executive officer of JAMB, Prof Dibu Ojerinde, who disclosed that the number is 08095515420 said JAMB is most embarrassed as the message tried to associate him with its illegal activities.

Prof Ojerinde in a press statement made available to LEADERSHIP said JAMB wishes to draw the attention of the public ‘to the illegal activities of some faceless and fraudulent activities of persons who have been circulating SMS purportedly asking parents and guardians to contact EL’ Technologies for non-existing biometric solution for UTME in Abuja.

It further revealed that the message reads thus: This is to notify all accredited centres in Abuja with 10 digits access codes that they are to contact EL-Technologies for all their biometric enquiries regarding the 2012 UTME offline registration’.

Prof Ojerinde also called and appealed to the Police high command in the FCT to help track down the fraudsters and use them as deterrents for others who might want to practise such illegal activities.

Students and non students all over the country have continued to react to the broadcast and published statements of the national president of the National Association of Nigerian Students, NANS, Comrade Dauda Mohammed, and have referred to his u-turn over the fuel subsidy removal as an unpopular move which is capable of disintegrating Nigerian students.

Some of the students who reacted on face book and also spoke on the condition of anonymity, expressed sadness at the decision of the president which they said were a total blackmail and a slap on the entire student’s body with the claim that they were not carried along and the present executive members do not represent their aspirations.

Some of them who claimed that the NANS president and his team must have been bought over by the federal government, hence the move, called on all students to as a matter of urgency arise and fight for their birthright which they claimed has been sold.

They said, ‘The students of Nigeria need to take a positive stand on the so-called leadership of NANS, otherwise your birth right will still be played with. Imagine what your so-called leader was saying. Are Nigerian students foolish to that extent?”

It will be recalled that the leadership of NANS had meet with President Goodluck Jonathan on the 12th of December 2011 concerning the fuel subsidy removal and had categorically told the government that it was against its removal. It was also on record that they were assured that all Nigerians including NANS will be taken along with the month of its removal tagged to April after several consultations had been made.

It’s also on record that the president had screamed foul over the case of impersonation in which he alleged that the second runner-up during the campaign in the person of Mr Adakole Ochia was invited to sign a document agreeing with the federal government on the fuel subsidy removal which was against the agreement the association had with the president.

After other consultations between NANS and some government officials, the association called for a press conference and the president appealed to students nationwide to shun protests and trust the association’s leadership in its on-going dialogue with the federal government.

He said ‘We assure our teeming members nationwide that should the dialogue fail to address our propositions already tabled before the government, our capacity in resisting the policy will be enforced to the latter’.

He further said ‘NANS appreciates the courage of President Goodluck Jonathan in removing the fraudulent fuel subsidy and agrees in totality with the federal government on the inevitability of the removal. We strongly believe that the subsidy removal is a bold step in fighting the corruption that has defied all known accounting principle in NNPC’.

Chairman of the Academic Staff Union of Polytechnics, Lagos State Polytechnic Chapter (LASPO), Mr. Arowolo Olatunji has said that the on-going strike by Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) and removal of fuel subsidy by President Goodluck Jonathan has caused more havoc to the education sector in Nigeria.

He disclosed this during a mass protest and rally organized by Nigerian Labour Congress (NLC) to fight government on the removal of fuel subsidy on the 1st of January 2012.

According to him, “The increment in Premium Motor Spirit (PMS) would have a great effect on education and before this increment; Lagos State government had earlier increased school fees in all tertiary institutions”.

“For example, LASU tuition increased from N25.000 to N250.00 and with the increment in petroleum, it shows there is going to be another regime of new school fees.’

The ASUP chairman added that there is going to be a challenge in the area of students’ enrolment due to hike in pump price.? “Part of the palliative measures?? federal government is planning to put in place is provision of jobs but who are they planning to give the jobs to? I think what they should tackle should be to eliminate corruption in the system.’

‘UNESCO demands large amount of money for the education sector. If government is really serious, they need to increase the budget instead of causing more problems in order for our people to have qualitative education.’

We have given options to President Jonathan to resign since the education sector is suffering setbacks and the ASUU strike is still on without attention from federal government.

Olatunji stressed further, “We have seen the man’s capability is in question and we need to know the university Mr. President attended to acquire his PhD because it is a disgrace to the education sector and academics in particular.’

He therefore advised Nigerian students to be prayerful in order for education sector to survival without more damage by the present administration.

It would be recalled that lecturers and professors in Lagos State University and Lagos State Polytechnic joined the last week protest and mass rally organized by Nigerian Labour Congress (NLC).

The authorities of the Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida University (IBBU), Lapai, Niger State, has dismissed four students for gross misconduct, the university Registrar, Malam Sama’la Muhammad has announced.

The university’s newsletter, “IBBUL News’’ quoted Muhammad? as having said? that the university’s Senate approved the expulsion of four students for gross misconduct.

He gave the names of the students as Abubakar Ahmed Wushishi, Idris Aliyu, Yusuf Habech Oladipo and Badamosi A. Jibrin.

The registrar said, “Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida University has zero tolerance for negative tendencies by students and staff alike.

“The affected students have been directed to hand over all university property in their possession to the security department.

“And consequently appropriate measures have been taken to check their re-admission into the university.

“The management will not fold its arms, while a few misguided members conduct themselves in manners inimical to the realisation of the mission and vision of the university,’’ he said.

The Federal Polytechnic, Bida in Niger State, has expelled 11 and rusticated 373 students for various examination malpractices during its 2010/2011 academic session.

Rector of the polytechnic, Alhaji Abdullahi Sule, said in an interview, yesterday, in Minna that the students were apprehended while committing fraud during examinations in the school.

According to him, some of the affected students refused to appear before Zonal Examination Misconduct Committee and had been on indefinite suspension.

The rector disclosed that the expelled and rusticated students had already been put on the blacklist of the institution and that “any one of them seen within the premises of the polytechnic after resumption will be shown the way out by our security personnel
“The security personnel within the area had been notified and given the list of the affected students and will arrest anyone found within the premises” he added.

Alhaji Sule said that the school would not relent in its determination to get rid of examination malpractices even as he stressed that the authorities of the school would never compromise the set standard for the training of its students.

It was again a black Christmas in Madalla, Suleja local government area of Niger State as early morning bomb blasts killed twelve persons, including three policemen on the spot and left many injured.

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The blast tore through St Theresa's Church in Madalla as worshippers gathered for Christmas services. The Church, located at the centre of the border settlement between the state and federal Capital, Abuja.
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LEADERSHIP gathered that the bomb went off at about 7.30 am as many worshippers arrived church for the early morning mass to commemorate the Christmas.
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No fewer than two hundred worshippers were gathered inside the church, which resulted in the high casualty rate. Several other persons were severely injured and rushed to various hospitals in Suleja and the F.C.T.
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An emergency official told reporters that the authorities were struggling to cope with the casualties.
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Spokesman of the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA), Yushau Shuaibu told the BBC that the explosion had happened in the street outside the church. But he said the church had been badly affected by the blast, and the number of dead was likely to rise.
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Earlier he told Reuters news agency: “We are presently evacuating the dead and the injured, but unfortunately we don't have enough ambulances.
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“Most of our ambulances have gone to operate on the major highways of the country.”
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Witnesses said windows of nearby houses had been shattered by the explosion.
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Officials at the local hospital said the condition of many of the injured was serious, and they were seeking help from bigger medical facilities.
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No group has said it carried out the attack.
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The Police Commissioner in charge of the state, Alhaji Ibrahim Maishanu said: “ I can confirm that a bomb blast occurred in Madalla this morning and so far, 12 persons, including three policemen have so far died as a result of the blast and several others were ?injured.

A total of 39,066 candidates, representing 9.65 per cent? of students who sat for November/December 2011 West African Senior Secondary Certificate Examination (WASSCE) had their result withheld by the examination body for their alleged involvement in examination malpractices.

This is just as more candidates obtained credits and above in English Language and Mathematics.

Head of the Nigeria National office of WAEC, Dr. Iyi Uwadiae, disclosed this yesterday at a press conference at Yaba, Lagos state.

A total of 394,337 candidates, representing 97.4 per cent have their results fully processed, while 10,526 candidates representing 2.6 per cent have few subjects still been processed for various errors.

Uwadiae said, “Out of the candidates who sat for the examination, 226,658 candidates representing 60.86 per cent obtained credits and above in Mathematics while 226,188 candidates representing 59.82 per cent obtained credit and above in English Language.

“147,012 candidates, representing 37.92 per cent obtained credits and above in six subjects, 199,214 candidates representing 51.39 per cent obtained credits and above in five subjects, 246, 312 candidates representing 63.54 per cent obtained credits and above in four subjects, whereas 287,918 candidates representing 74.27 per cent obtained credits and above in three subjects.

“A total of 324,393 candidates representing 83.68 per cent obtained credits and above in two subjects.”

Uwadiae stated that out of 49 blind candidates who sat for the examination, 17 representing 34.69 per cent obtained credits and above in five subjects.

A total of 404,863 candidates, comprising of 225,023 male and 179,840 female candidates,? sat for Nov/Dec 2011, WASSCE.

He, therefore, appreciated the contributions of the government, corporate organisations, and other stakeholders, who assisted the Council in its efforts to conduct credible examinations and award internationally recognised certificates to deserving Nigerian youth.

President? of? the? Academic Staff Union of? Nigerian Universities (ASUU),? Prof. Ukachukwu Awuzie said the? ongoing? strike? is not aimed at frustrating students as speculated in some quarters. He said, rarther, it was aimed at rescuing the education sector in the country.

Prof? Awuzie? in? an exclusive? chat with LEADERSHIP SUNDAY pointed out that ASUU? in? its? magnanimity allowed universities to? complete? their? second? semester exams, stressing that the strike will be called off as soon as government shows? ASUU a working plan and commensurate commitment towards raising? academic standards in universities .

His words: “As intellectuals,? we? cannot? continue with? such? degrading academic? standards.? However, I am rightly informed that? government? is? working? out? some? developmental plans,? soon? as? they? come? up? with these? plans with commitment towards its? implementations, ASUU will call off? the? strike, ”? Awuzie? assured???

The ASUU strike caught up? with the second? semester exams of? some universities. Students? could have lost a semester? and? probably one? full academic? year if ASUU had not been lenient to give those universities? within Monday 12 and? Wednesday 15 of? December, to? complete their exams.

At the University of Abuja, investigations reveal that while students were happy for not missing an academic year,?? they however condemned the “unbearable conditions under which the exams? were? conducted.”