2017 Utme: Jamb Meets With Cbt Centre Owners

Source: thewillnigeria.com

SAN FRANCISCO, December 12, (THEWILL) – Ahead of the 2017 Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination, UTME, the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board, JAMB, is set for an interaction with owners of Computer Based Test, CBT, centres in the country.

This was made known in a statement issued to newsmen in Lagos on Monday by the board's Head, Media and Information, Dr Fabian Benjamin, which revealed that the meeting which comes up on Tuesday at the University of Lagos.

Disclosing that the meeting is to fine tune all areas of challenges geared towards conducting a hitch-free examination in 2017, JAMB stated that it would determine the number of centres to be used for 2017 all CBT UTME exercise.

According to the statement, “These are centres that must have a minimum of 250 and above terminals (computers).

“We will not hesitate to disqualify any centre that falls short of the requirements.

“We will equally not compromise on the selection of these centres as they will fully be responsible for our registration and examinations and other related responsibilities that they will be saddled with from time to time as we introduce new measures.''

Benjamin explained that the board decided to come face to face with owners of these centre to ensure it got first-hand information on the challenges they were faced with in the course of the examinations.

“As partners in progress, we need to sit down on a round table and tell each other the truth so as to get to the root of all the hiccups.

“We should all feel concerned even if it was just one centre that had challenges or hitches during the conduct of the last examination.

“Nigerians expect a lot from us and we must strive not to fail them.

“We are looking at strengthening what was done holistically to improve on the previous exercises,'' the statement quoted the board's Registrar, Prof. Ishaq Oloyede as saying.

Expressing its commitment to giving Nigerians globally accepted standard in the conduct of the examinations, JAMB disclosed that it would soon commence the sale of application forms and urged prospective candidates not to patronise any self-acclaimed agent as the board had not and would not appoint any.

The statement urged candidates to always visit the board's website for information, disclosing that in a few months, the board had been working tirelessly on processes that were connected to the conduct of the examination.

It added that the board had taken stock of all the challenges that were recorded during the 2016 exercise, especially CBT centre related issues.

The board expressed its resolve to give every Nigerian child desirous of tertiary education a level playing ground to compete for the available space in these tertiary institutions.

“We are mindful of the fact that any child that writes in a dysfunctional centre is at disadvantage.

“All candidates must have same conditions, atmosphere and working facilities,” read the statement.