JAMB CBT Anecdotes


WHERE DO THE QUESTIONS ORIGINATE FROM AND WHO ARE THE ANSWERS SUBMITTED TO? A CANDIDATE ASKED.

At Abubakar Tafawa Balewa University, Bauchi a candidate by name Nafisa Ismail Njidda was replete with thrilling experiences at different stages. In one of such cases, she “Sir, where do the questions originate from and who are the answers submitted to?” She was informed that the questions originated from JAMB and the responses were also submitted to JAMB.

After being educated about the benefits of CBT, she exclaimed, “my goodness!! I seemed to have been misinformed about this CBT”

FIAM NO CHEATING

“Abasi!! I thought I could have extra time. But fiam!! The computer just submitted for me without my authority. No cheating at all”.

DOWN BUT NOT OUT!

Oluwaremilekun arrived at about 2½ hours into the examination at ChamsCity, Abuja on 18th May, 2013. She was turned back despite her reasons for coming late. She came from Badagry and the vehicle broke down between Lokoja and Abaji.

On Monday 20th May, 2013, Remilekun joined the queue to take the examination. The biometric verification officer detected that she was not supposed to be in the examination hall. She had missed her chance, as exemplified in her e-registration slip. She was asked to go away.

The persistent girl did not leave the gate of ChamsCity, Abuja. She ‘camped’ herself with three mothers. The mothers, staff members of JAMB, became sympathetic and extraordinarily emotional, they asked the girl to wait for the Registrar.

As I came down that fateful morning, the three mothers surrounded me to plead for the girl. Following their persuasion, I yielded and asked the girl to come for the afternoon session of the examination.

The girl Oluwaremilekun, sat for the afternoon session of the examination on 20th May, 2013, the first candidate at the gate. “Remilekun, what do you want again” asked one of the mothers. “I have come to say thank you ma, I got my result before I slept last night and I scored 224”. Mabel, one of the mothers jumped up for joy and shouted Hallelujah as if it was her daughter.

PROMPT RELEASE OF RESULTS

A female candidate that sat for the CBT morning session on one of the examination days came back during the afternoon session and exclaimed “Sir, 419 people have come again, I just wrote my examination this morning, when I got home I received this text message telling me, ‘Congratulations, you scored ….. in your 2013 UTME’. So I am here to confirm whether it is true or false”. When the text message was checked, it was confirmed to be true and she was very happy.

CBT ACCOMMODATES CANDIDATES WITH PHYSICAL DISABILITY

It was yet another bright day and candidates had already formed a long queue in front of the

Biometric machine, eager to be verified before being allowed into the CBT halls.

Then I watched the Centre Co-ordinator help a girl to the front of the queue. It took the joint effort of the two of us to get her hand steady on the verification machine as she shook vigorously from head to toe.

I watched her hit the keyboard with far more ease than she would have had to shade on the A – D spaces provided on the OMR answer sheet for PPT examinations. There was no way she would have been able to shade the small spaces provided on PPT OMR answer sheet. NO WAY!!!

AND THE BOY WAS LUCKY

A candidate that missed his original date of examination came insisting that it was JAMB that

misled him. I took my initiative to allow him sit for the examination during the next session even though I was not aware I could possibly do that. On the second day, a colleague called to inform me of a similar case in his centre and guess what! I, on reflex shouted “OH MY GOD, THE BOY WAS LUCKY”.

CBT ALLOWS TEST RE-SCHEDULING

In Umaru Musa Yar’adua University, Katsina, forty-one (41) candidates’ who missed their test because they were not aware of the rescheduled date from Tuesday, 21st May to Saturday, 18th May, 2013 were allowed to sit for the test on Monday, 20th May, 2013 and Tuesday 21st May, 2013 respectively. This was amazing to a lot of them who had come feeling demoralized because they felt they had missed the test and thus had no hope of sitting for the test again until the following year. The affected candidates were happy that they were allowed to sit for the test. They would have lost the opportunity to sit for the examination under the PPT mode

WHERE IS OK?

During the maiden CBT examination at JAMB Office Makurdi, candidates from Wase, Plateau State, came to take the examination. These candidates applied to write the Paper and Pencil Test (PPT) but due to crisis in their area, they could not participate in the examination. The Board graciously allowed them to come and take CBT at JAMB new office, Makurdi since the facilities were adequate.

At the gate of the office, the expression on their faces was as if they were being led to the guillotine. This was understandable given the fact that many of the candidates shied away from the CBT. However, their faces brightened up as soon as instructions were passed to them on how to write the examination even without prior knowledge of computer usage.

When the examination commenced, one of the students asked “Where is question number 1?” Meanwhile, question number 1 was already displayed on the screen.

Later, one candidate raised up his hand. An official went to him and the following conversation took place.

Official: What is the problem?

Student: See my screen, I don’t understand what to do next.

(This student was done with answering questions on Use of English, and a message was displayed informing him to begin the next subject. He was expected to click the OK button to continue).

Official: The message on your screen is informing you that you have completed one subject

and that you need to click OK to begin the next subject. Now, click OK to continue.

Student: Where is OK?

The exam was successfully conducted for the Wase candidates. Many of them even completed the exam before the regulated time. Without the CBT, all of them would have lost one year.

CBT VALIDATED

Promise Ogbonna was one of the candidates of Baptist High School, Abuja who sat for the maiden edition of 2013 CBT between May 18th and 1st June 2013.

The Registrar/Chief Executive of JAMB, Prof. ‘Dibu Ojerinde, was impressed with the candidates for their smartness and the speed with which they completed the examination earlier than the scheduled time. On enquiry about the CBT, they all echoed ‘very fine’. The following day, after the Sunday service, the Baptist Church members came to the Registrar to thank him for the prompt release of CBT results. He remarked that the instant release of results is one of the beauties of CBT. To the joy of the school authorities, each of the candidates scored above 200. Excitedly it was announced that, one Promise Ogbonna scored 287 in CBT which is the highest 2013 UTME score in the School.

To validate the standard of CBT Score, two months after CBT, a price giving day took place in the school, where the highest scorer in CBT in the school was also confirmed the highest recipient of prices. Promise received six different prices, that is, in five subjects in the WAEC Mock examination as follows – English Language, Mathematics, Further Mathematics, Chemistry, Sciences as well as price for the best UTME score.

Promise has been offered admission on merit to study Electrical/Electronic Engineering at the Federal University of Technology, Owerri (FUTO)

THIS MAN HAS BROKEN THE RECORD AGAIN

The apprehension occasioned by the decision of JAMB to introduce computer-based testing in the conduct of its public examination was almost palpable to say the least.

A lecturer at the Kogi State Polytechnic even expressed his reservations openly when he exclaimed, “This country is not ready for electronic testing, we are still grappling with PHCN power outages, coupled with the multitudes of people in the rural areas who cannot even operate the computer, I think JAMB is only looking for guinea pigs with which to test run CBT”.

However, between 18th and 28th May, 2013 CBT sessions were conducted at the Polytechnic hitch-free to the astonishment of the Rector, who on the last day of the examination, blurted out, “This man has broken the record again”.