No fewer than 12,500 candidates participated in this year’s
Post-Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME) Screening
Exercise, conducted by the Federal University of Agriculture, Abeokuta (FUNAAB).
The Director of Academic Planning, Prof. Olukayode Akinyemi, while
reviewing the exercise, commended the efforts of the Federal Government
in bench-marking the admission process, because it would allow many
prospective students to have access to other levels of higher education
such as the Polytechnics and Colleges of Education.
He stated that it was imperative for Universities to have their own
bench-marks, to maintain high standards. He noted that there were still
other ways of screening-out candidates with bad characters even though
they might have met the basic academic requirements in the interest of
the system.
Prof. Akinyemi, however, advised candidates who could not be admitted
into FUNAAB not to be discouraged as there were other institutions that
could still admit them, because for now, FUNAAB could only admit about
3,500 applicants.
Also speaking, the Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Academic), Professor
Adekojo Waheed, said the exercise was a huge success in a bid to getting
the best candidates for the University. He likened the candidates to
raw materials that any company would need before manufacturing its
products.
Prof. Waheed added that the University was not prepared to start
training and re-training half-baked candidates when admitted, as this
could lead to a draw-back in attaining the set objectives of FUNAAB.
While comparing the screening exercise with those of previous years,
Prof. Waheed listed the improvement recorded to include the adoption of
finger-print screening and biometrics by every candidate before being
allowed to sit for the examination.
He said this was made possible because every candidate’s data had
been domiciled with the University with the relevant information, to
guard against impersonation.
In addition, he noted that candidates were not allowed within the
screening premises, to use their mobile phones, electronic devices, bags
and luggage as part of preventive measures against cheating.
The Chairperson, Admissions Committee of the University, Professor Oluyemisi Eromosele, also gave a pass-mark to the exercise.
She described it as highly successful as everything went on fine as scheduled in terms of logistics.
Prof. Eromosele, who doubles as the Dean, College of Physical
Sciences (COLPHYS), re-iterated the commitment of FUNAAB at encouraging
students to study agriculture-related courses, when compared with other
programmes run by the University.