How do you pass a test on a computer if you’ve never used a computer before?
To get into university, Nigerian students must take an entrance test. Since 2015, this test has been computer-based – locking out those who have never used computers in school or at home
Abdullahi D. Hassan in Bauchi
To get into university, Nigerian students must take an entrance test.Since 2015, this test has been computer-based – locking out hundreds of thousands of rural and urban students who have never used computers in school or at home. A group of volunteers is trying to bring some of those candidates back.
At Sarkin Yamma Community College in the Toro area of Bauchi state in Northeast Nigeria, 233 students from 12 area schools gather around 11 computers. Each one will get a 15-minute session during which a volunteer will show them how to enter their exam registration number, open the university entrance test, and move and control the mouse to choose their answers.
For now, that’s all they will learn about operating computers, but it may be all they need to pursue their real dreams.
“Frankly, this is my first experience using a computer in my life. I feel delighted,” says 24-year-old Abdulfatah Khalil, one of the students gathered.
Hamza Muhammad Usama, an 18-year-old son of a herdsman who dreams of becoming a veterinary doctor, hopes the training “will reduce the panic I have over computer-based exams”.
It doesn’t work for everyone – not immediately. Khadija Tasiu, 16, sat for the computer-based test last year but didn’t score enough to get into university. She plans to retake the exam this month and is at Yamma Community College for the volunteers’ training, hoping it will cure her computer anxiety and allow her to study for a nursing degree.
Pass rates have plummeted in the years since the national test became computer-based.
Initially, the board offered to bridge the gap with a mock exam – for an extra 1,500 naira ($1.21) out of their own pocket.
Many do pay: 260,000 candidates did the mock test this year. Still, pass rates have remained so low that the registrar, Ishaq Oleyede, lowered the cut-off mark for admission to 140 for universities, 100 for technical schools and 80 for other colleges, of the 400 total points possible.
The volunteers, who work under a local organisation called My Makranata, are taking a more hands-on approach to bridging the gap.
“We steadied shaky hands as we encouraged them, emphasising that technology was nothing to be scared about and they could finish up on their own,” says Chima Begotten, the programme manager at My Makranata, after the day’s sessions at Yamma Community College.
“I am overjoyed seeing that we were able to add value to the lives of students in the area. We have the privilege of teaching a plethora of students how to use the mouse for the first time.”
The students shared her assessment.
“It was amazing because throughout my life and school days, I never touched a computer,” says 17-year-old Rachel Peter, who dreams of studying pharmacy at university. But she wishes it was not a one-off opportunity. “When we ask our teachers about computers, they say they will work on it. Imagine if we had computers in my class. Even five computers would let us to learn to operate it. Then the test would be easy.”