By Yinka Salaam
Concerns by many Nigerians have greeted the result of the just concluded Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME), indicating that only 21.5% (420,415 candidates) scored 200 and above out of 1,955,069 candidates who sat for the 2025.
The data showed that 75% of candidates scored below 200 in the exam, with less than 1% scoring above 300.
The bulk of the candidates scored between 160 and 199, accounting for 50.29% (983,187 candidates), while 334,560 candidates (17.11%) fell within the 200-249 score range.
Another 488,197 candidates (24.97%) scored between 140 and 159, and 73,441 (3.76%) achieved scores from 250 to 299.
A smaller percentage of candidates — 57,419 (2.94%) — scored between 120 and 139, while 3,820 (0.20%) scored between 100 and 119. Only 2,031 candidates (0.10%) scored below 100.
The board however said 40,247 underage candidates were granted special approval to take the exam due to their exceptional academic ability.
However, only 467 of them (1.16%) met the defined excellence threshold for the UTME. These candidates were expected to progress through three additional assessment stages to confirm their outstanding capabilities.
As usual, many were quick to attribute the poor performance to low admission cut off marks which enables many institutions that are privately owned and newly established to fill up their slots.
They argued that many of the students know they will get admitted eventually if they don’t score very high marks.
But focussing only on the cut-off marks for some categories of higher institutions and some not-too-demanding courses may be misleading and might not allow us focus on the real issues.
Dwindling academic performance by students can be attributed to a combination of factors that need serious dissecting. If many students pass the entrance examinations, the cut off will naturally improve and JAMB won’t need to lower the cut-off mark unnecessarily.
In a piece titled, Why Are Our Students Scoring So Low? A Wake Up Call For Nigeria, Dr. Tesleem Orewole, acknowledged that, “This isn’t the first time we’re witnessing such alarming results. Back in 2021, an even more shocking 87% of candidates scored below the benchmark”, meaning, what we are witnessing may be a positive development that needs to be improved upon, going by the performance of the recent past.
Dr Orewole however posited that the problem isn’t just the students but “the system, the society, and the environment we’ve built around education.”
Viewing and hearing cultures
In this era, reading culture is virtually dead and it’s yielding ground for the viewing and hearing cultures. These days, students are more engaged in TikTok, yahoo (cyber crime, get-rich-quick syndrome) oloso (hookup) platforms and so on.
Another problem identified by Dr Orewole is lack of reward for excellence. This age, while the best students in our higher institutions and winners of inter-collegiate quiz, and inter-universities debates as well as academic and brain-tasking science and technology competitions go home with paltry or ridiculous amount; winners of practically useless entertainment program and TV reality shows go home with hundreds of millions of Naira, car gifts, houses etc. In fact, such winners are appointed as Youth Ambassadors by unworthy politicians, while those who excel in academic competitions are often ignored and largely unrewarded.
According to Dr Orewole, “in today’s Nigeria, academic excellence is no longer inspiring. Many of our brightest minds struggle in poverty. University professors – those we expect young people to look up to (the lecturers) – can’t even afford 10-year-old used vehicles. Is that the kind of future that inspires hard work and dedication?”, he queried.
He noted that these same students often go abroad and excel. Why? Because in places like America and Europe, excellence is encouraged, rewarded, and respected.
Dr Orewole also attributed the phenomenon of low performance in UTME examination to crass materialism and corruption: “We now live in a country where wealth is worshipped, regardless of how it’s acquired. When fraudsters are celebrated and scholars are ignored, what message are we sending to our youths?
“Sadly, some parents are even aiding the rot, helping their children cheat through secondary school exams. No wonder many students who score poorly in UTME somehow had “distinctions” in their SSCE. It’s not about ability – it’s about a deeply flawed system that rewards shortcuts over substance.
“The situation is dire. Just two days ago, a newspaper reported a mother enrolling her child in a school that teaches online fraud tricks. This is the kind of moral collapse we are dealing with.”
In addition to Dr Orewole’s position, for those who attributed the low performance to lower cut-off marks, it is important to note that students don’t not just fail UTME because JAMB lowered the cut off marks. The lowering of cut off marks is associated with the fact that private and some state universities were admitting students with much lower marks, particularly with some courses, in order to break even. Hence, the fixing of generic cut off marks is usually done with the knowledge of (after JAMB must have met with) the VCs and other stakeholders in the universities and the polytechnics.
At the end of the day, many universities do organise post-UTME to uphold the standard. UTME can’t be the only yardstick to adjudged brilliance, readiness and fitness for a particular course. It is just a requirement. JAMB Registrar has explained this on many occasions.
JAMB has explained before that examination may not be the true test of ability in all cases. A student may score low marks in the UTME because of subject combination, not necessarily because he or she is not brilliant. Someone who wants to study history, philosophy, psychology or religious study may be required to write Economics and Government in the examination. Sometimes, the students may not necessarily need some of these subjects to survive in the chosen course of study. It may also be because of toughness of the papers, just as it may be because of stress or lateness to the examination hall, malfunction of the CBT computers, non-versatility in the use of ICT equipment and so on.
What many critics are not aware of is that, at times, a large percentage of UTME candidates are underage or SS2 students who merely sat for the examination for familiarity sake and to garner confidence – just to warm up. Such students are actually not ready for the admission, hence, higher marks should not be expected from such students. Consequently, these set of students swell up the number of those who sat for and fail the examination.
Herculean Task
Subsequently, Dr Orewole submitted that Nigerians have a herculean task ahead. “To change the narrative, we must: rebuild our economy, so that hard work pays, restore value to education, so our best minds don’t keep running abroad and celebrate integrity and academic achievement; not flashy lifestyles funded by crime.
“Until then, we will keep producing UTME results that reflect not just poor preparation, but a broken value system. It’s time to wake up, Nigeria. Let’s fix this,” he concluded.
Hence, all hands must be on deck to improve education in Nigeria. Government cannot do it all. Why the government, its agencies, law enforcement agents and the judiciary must wake up to their billings, parents, religious bodies, the relevant NGOs as well the students themselves must do the right thing to return to the part of academic excellence.
