Analyst Highlights How Alausa's Reforms Expand Access to Tertiary Education in Nigeria
- Education analyst Seyi Gesinde said Nigeria’s tertiary education reforms under Education Minister Tunji Alausa are expanding access to higher institutions
- The highlighted reforms include UTME exemptions for Colleges of Education and some agricultural courses, as well as changes to ordinary level requirements
- The education minister spoke about how his reforms, including the latest on UTME exemptions, are backed by data
Abuja, FCT - Education minister Tunji Alausa is leading one of the country’s most ambitious tertiary education access reforms aimed at reducing admission bottlenecks and expanding opportunities for millions of students, education analyst Seyi Gesinde said.
Highlighting Alausa's vision, Gesinde made reference to a Channels Television interview where the minister said his reforms were designed to address longstanding barriers that have kept many qualified Nigerians out of higher institutions.
Source: Twitter
“They want to go to school,” Alausa said.
“They want to go to school. President Bola Ahmed Tinubu has created significant, unfettered financial access to them by creating the National Education Loan Fund. So any kid who wants to go to any tertiary institution today can go, not because you are indigent or because you have poor parents, that’s been settled,” he added.
Admission crisis drives reforms
According to Gesinde, the minister backed the reforms with statistics showing the scale of Nigeria’s tertiary admission gap.
“There would be about 2.2 million people doing UTME year by year, and about 770,000 people would be admitted,” Alausa said during the referenced TV interview.
“Leaving the gap. So what happened to 1.3 million people? That gets carried over to the following year.”
For years, the imbalance left many young Nigerians repeatedly sitting for entrance examinations without securing admission despite meeting basic academic requirements.
Gesinde said the reforms sought to tackle deeper structural problems, including financial exclusion, rigid admission policies and underutilised institutions.
Government relaxes admission requirements
One of the administration’s early interventions by Alausa involved changes to ordinary level admission requirements for tertiary institutions.
“And we said, if you are going to study Law, why do you need a credit in Mathematics? If you are going to study Science, why do you need credit in English? We abolished that,” Alausa stated.
Under the revised policy, candidates pursuing Arts, Law and social science courses can proceed through some admission pathways without compulsory Mathematics credits, while certain science and engineering applicants may no longer necessarily require English credits.
According to the minister, the policy changes increased admission numbers significantly.
“For the first time in the history of our country, last year, with the changes we made to the previously restrictive ordinary level requirement, we increased the number of people from 770,000 to 1.1 million students,” he said.
“We added almost 400,000 more students.”
UTME exemptions target teachers, agriculture shortages
The reforms have also widened alternative admission pathways. The federal government recently approved the removal of Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME) requirements for candidates seeking admission into Colleges of Education, as well as applicants for non-technology agricultural courses in polytechnics and monotechnics.
Alausa said the decision followed data showing that many Colleges of Education were operating below capacity despite shortages of qualified teachers across the country.
“We do all these things based on data, not abstraction,” he said.
The minister said the latest reforms could push annual admissions across tertiary institutions to about 1.5 million students.
“Guess what, this year alone, with the changes we are making through eliminating UTME requirements for College of Education and UTME requirements for non-technology agricultural courses in our polytechnics and monotechnics, would increase the number of people being admitted throughout tertiary institutions to about 1.5 million.”
“That is literally doubling it from two years ago.”
Reforms linked to food security, curriculum review
Alausa linked part of the reforms to Nigeria’s broader food security agenda.
“The exemptions are for people going into colleges of education and people going to monotechnics or polytechnics to study non-technology agriculture courses, and there is a reason for that. We need that to help food security in our country,” he explained.
Beyond admissions, the education ministry is also reviewing agricultural curricula in tertiary institutions to align teaching with mechanised farming and technology-driven agriculture.
“Hopefully by the end of this year, we will have a brand new agric curriculum that meets modern day standard,” the minister said.
Student loan scheme at centre of reforms
At the centre of the reforms is the Nigerian Education Loan Fund (NELFUND), which was created to help students from low-income families access tuition and upkeep support.
Government figures indicate that hundreds of billions of naira have been disbursed to students across tertiary institutions nationwide.
Gesinde said the reforms were aimed at expanding educational opportunities in a country where access to higher education has long been constrained by poverty and institutional bottlenecks.
While critics have raised concerns over infrastructure deficits, lecturer shortages and the capacity of institutions to absorb rising enrolment, the analyst said the reforms marked a major shift toward lowering barriers to tertiary education rather than tightening them.
Source: Twitter
FG takes key decision on entry age for universities, others
In a related development, the federal government has retained 16 years as the minimum admission age into tertiary institutions across the country.
Alausa made the disclosure on Monday, May 11, in Abuja while delivering his address at the 2026 Policy Meeting on admissions to tertiary institutions.
The event was put together by the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB).
Source: Legit.ng
