Many people did not understand the import of the recent university ranking that placed Covenant University, Otta, Ogun State first in Nigeria. On the surface, that ranking showed that Nigeria’s private universities have arrived. They are no longer to be seen as “glorified secondary schools” as many used to tag them. But it portends danger.
In the Times Higher Education’s 2024 rating, Covenant University, University of Ibadan and the Federal University of Technology, Akure were recorded as the top three universities in Nigeria. Even though Covenant University came first in Nigeria, it was placed within the global 801-1000 range in that ranking. That is not good news to Nigeria. But there is more that can be gleaned from the ranking, which should make every Nigerian worried.
Until recently, many people would vow never to send their children to any private university. Employers of labour also looked down on graduates from private universities. The assumption was that these private universities were not well equipped to train students to become dependable graduates. Many saw them as merchants who were more concerned about the money they stand to make from students than the knowledge they would transfer to the students.
However, many factors have been leading to a change in perception. The first is the issue of perennial industrial strikes by lecturers of universities owned by the Federal Government and state governments. These strikes last for months. The latest – which occurred last year – lasted from February to October (eight months). If a normal academic session lasts nine months, it means that students of public universities lost one academic year to strike in 2022.
Sometimes, when the academic staff is done with its strike, the non-academic staff commences its own. At other times, it could be the students themselves embarking on a violent protest which leads to the closure of the university. As a result of these disruptions, students spend more years than they are supposed to. Some students spend up to six years on a course that is supposed to last for four years.
Another reason is the dilapidated and inadequate facilities in the universities. Libraries have outdated books and non-digitalised facilities. Laboratories are poorly equipped and unfit for experiments. Classrooms are too small for the number of students. Chairs in them are run down. Hostels are too few and poorly equipped, with up to 10 students living in a room meant for four. Some students even sleep on the floor.
In addition, lecturers in public universities are frequently accused of exploitation and victimisation. There are regular accusations of sexual harassment whereby female students, especially, are blackmailed to offer sex in exchange of higher scores. There are also accusations of lecturers victimising students who fail to buy their books or printed lecture notes called handouts.
There is also the challenge of opaque rules and corruption in the admission of students into the public universities. Students who have higher scores in the Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination most times get bypassed for others with lower scores. They end up spending some years rewriting the exam, losing time and getting frustrated.
Finally, there is the challenge of the questionable lifestyle in the public universities. Issues of secret cults, drug abuse, violence, rape, modern-day prostitution, suicide, intimidation, etc, are usually more rampant in public universities. Most of the first-generation private universities are owned by religious organisations who have stringent rules on how students should behave. Those who breach the rules get rusticated. And after paying the high tuition fees, nobody wants to be sent out of the university. In Nigeria, a teenager who fails to acquire university education does not have other options of what to do.
As a result of these factors, the private universities have been attracting more attention in the last two decades from Nigeria’s middle-class families. Those who either don’t want their children to go abroad for their tertiary education or those who can’t afford it see the private universities as a better option than the public universities. This is heightened by the fact that it has become the standard for children to finish secondary education at about 16 years. Today’s parents are more protective of their children and don’t feel comfortable having them at such young age spend four years or more in a public university where the rules are lax.
With the drop in the quality of education from the public universities, there has been a rise in the quality of the graduates produced by private universities. Employers and others who used to sneer at graduates from private universities have started to change their attitude. It is becoming a thing of pride for people to flaunt themselves as graduates of private universities.
Therefore, although the first-position Covenant University took in the latest ranking of universities is a sign that the quality of education coming from private universities is on the rise, there is more to it than that. One warning that this rise is giving to the nation is that the tragedy that befell Nigerian public primary and secondary schools is about to befall the public universities.
While growing up in the 1970s and 80s in my Nnewi hometown in Anambra State, there were no private primary schools and secondary schools. All the schools were owned by the government. Eventually when private primary schools began to emerge in the 1980s, they were seen as of lower standard and sneered at. But soon, their pupils began to show brilliance and class. The public schools were getting dilapidated. Parents who had the wherewithal did not want their children raised in schools with leaking roof or broken ceiling. Gradually more people began to send their children to private schools, which culminated in the tragic situation the nation faces now, whereby only the children of the poor still attend public primary and secondary schools.
The public primary and secondary schools, which produced the political and business leaders of the country, have all been abandoned because the state governments and Federal Government cannot maintain them. Old boys and old girls of the respective schools continually raise funds to renovate these schools, but they continue to get bad. In contrast, schools run by religious bodies and individuals are well maintained. The only challenge is the high fees they charge. Today’s parents, most of whom attended public schools, do not ever want their children to attend the same schools they attended, except the schools that were handed over to missionaries.
What is staring us in the face as a nation is that in the next decade or so, very few people will be sending their children to public universities. Private universities and foreign universities will be the destination of virtually every child whose parents can afford the fees. The same fate that befell the public schools will have befallen the public universities. Ordinarily, there should be no worry about that, since they will produce the same graduates. But Nigerian private schools and universities – except those that have been handed back to missionaries – don’t have the full environment and curriculum to produce well-rounded individuals. For example, most public schools have very small compound with no fields for sports and other extra-curricular activities. Most of the greatest sports men and women Nigeria produced were discovered in secondary school or university.
Therefore, it is very important that public schools and universities run side by side with private ones, so that people will have a choice. That will also ensure that the rich and the poor all get educated and given the same opportunities in life.
Source: Punch
