The Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB) has introduced a special registration window for highly gifted students under the age of 16 who wish to sit for the Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME). The board’s Registrar, Professor Ishaq Oloyede, made this known while speaking as a guest on Inside Sources with Laolu Akande, a programme aired on Channels Television.
Oloyede noted that while JAMB has maintained the official minimum entry age for tertiary institutions at 16, some rare cases of exceptionally brilliant students necessitated a new approach. He explained that students who believe they are gifted enough can now apply under the “Exceptionally Brilliant” category to take the exam despite being below the standard age.
“In Nigeria, there are many brilliant students, we have so many excellent people. We are enforcing the 16-year minimum entry into tertiary institutions but some people are saying there are exceptional students. Yes, there are exceptional students but they are just one in a million,” Oloyede said.
He further stated, “We are saying 16 years is the minimum but if you know you are exceptional, register for exceptional candidacy—that is, you are less than 16 years old and exceptional.”
While discussing this development, Oloyede expressed concern over the increasing number of underage students being pushed into higher education by their parents. He noted that some parents manipulate records to alter their children’s ages, allowing them to take UTME at an inappropriately young age.
“I’m surprised, just from Monday to now, over 2,000 have registered in the whole country. Some of them are 10, 11, and 12-year-olds whose parents have found crooked ways of jumping classes,” he noted.
Oloyede criticized the practice of age falsification, stating that some parents do it for personal recognition. “The parents want to use the children to decorate their CVs. They want to say I am the mother of a lawyer, my child graduated at age 13,” he lamented.
The issue of age requirements for university admissions has been a topic of debate in recent months. In November 2024, the Minister of Education, Dr. Tunji Alausa, announced the reversal of the 18-year minimum admission age to 16 years. He confirmed that there would be exceptions for highly talented students, aligning with JAMB’s new policy.
“We will not be going forward with the 18-year admission benchmark. We will go with 16 years and we are going to meet with the Joint Admission Matriculation Board and others on that,” Alausa said.
This decision overturned an earlier policy set by former Minister of Education, Professor Tahir Mamman, in July 2024, which had prohibited the admission of candidates under 18 into Nigerian tertiary institutions.
