The Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB) has commenced plans to incorporate critical thinking and life skills into the Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME), as part of efforts to align the admission test with evolving demands in higher education.

JAMB Registrar, Prof. Segun Aina, disclosed the development on Wednesday in Abuja during the inauguration of a committee comprising stakeholders and experts tasked with developing a framework for integrating the skills into the examination.

Aina explained that the proposed reform was based on the role of UTME in ranking candidates who have already obtained O-Level qualifications. He said the examination should not replicate subject-based assessments administered by examination bodies such as the West African Examinations Council (WAEC) and the National Examinations Council (NECO).

“So ours is a ranking task. It’s not necessarily to test your subject matter expertise. So we feel that making the UTME examination purely subject matter is a duplication of effort of sorts,” he said.

According to the registrar, JAMB will examine the skills candidates apply in real-life situations and assess whether the board’s existing methods of evaluating candidates remain effective in predicting their performance in universities, polytechnics and colleges of education.

He also pointed out that the UTME format has remained largely unchanged for more than three decades, making it necessary to assess whether the current approach continues to meet the needs of a changing education environment.

“The biggest room in the house is the room for improvement. So we want the committee to help us take a look at this,” he said.

Aina said the committee was intentionally constituted to represent different parts of the education sector, allowing stakeholders who would be affected by the proposed changes to participate in the reform process.

The Minister of Education, Dr Tunji Alausa, represented by the Technical Assistant to the Acting Permanent Secretary of the Federal Ministry of Education, Oni Adedeji, said the initiative was in line with ongoing efforts to reform assessment practices within the education sector.

Alausa tasked the committee with developing assessment approaches that are standardised, fair and transparent, while measuring analytical, logical and verbal reasoning beyond candidates’ ability to recall subject content.

He said the committee would also decide whether the proposed components should be tested through a separate standardised examination or incorporated into the existing UTME subjects.

The minister said the reform seeks to measure not just what young Nigerians know, but also their ability to think effectively, reason and solve problems.

Chairman of the committee, Prof. Boniface Nworgu of the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, said UTME should undergo continuous review to ensure it effectively identifies candidates who have strong prospects of succeeding in tertiary education.

Nworgu observed that developments in tertiary education curricula, including the transition to the Core Curriculum and Minimum Academic Standards, have increased the emphasis placed on skills and critical thinking.

“The focus now is the area of skills and then critical thinking. So, what JAMB is trying to do is understandable from that perspective,” he said.

He added that the committee would use evidence to establish whether the proposed changes would deliver their intended objectives and offer value for taxpayers’ money.

Membership of the committee includes representatives from universities, examination bodies, professional regulatory councils, students’ groups, secondary schools and development organisations.

Among the organisations represented are WAEC, the National Universities Commission, the National Board for Technical Education, the National Association of Nigerian Students and the United Nations Development Programme.

The committee has four weeks to review the proposal and present its initial recommendations. JAMB may thereafter engage assessment experts to work out the details of any framework eventually adopted.

Source: msmeafricaonline.com