The VSEC department handles entrepreneurial related issues and is an appendage of the School and I would want to believe that if the School Management considers it inappropriate that students’ union be carried along when taking decision on school fees, but what about EED?
The body handling Entrepreneurial education is handled by a Director and even when critical decisions are supposed to be taken, the President should be invited and not the other way round where some people fabricate figures based on their own indices to determine how much students pay and hand it over to them to go and consider to bring a reduction.
To me having that approach looks suspicious and should change! Some Institutions/Schools would even take decisions as this that “since they are giving them this soso amount, even if they are gonna beat it down, it can’t pass this amount the same thing I feel is happening here!
Majority of us are doing business and we know when a major decision would be taken to affect customers, you thread carefully by placing so many factors to consideration but in the educational sector, the reverse is the case because we all know “who would checkmate them?” as whether Institutions market their schools or not, students would come, a notion I feel many Institutions are involved in which is preposterous and uncalled for!
2016 – Downward
If memories won’t fail me, I did my National Diploma in Public Administration under the prestigious The Polytechnic Ibadan, Saki Campus and EED still reflect on my transcript till date and we paid N500 then as EED fee and everything was going on well as both the system and the processes involved were accepted by all and sundry.
THE SUDDEN CHANGE
During my administration as the Students’ Union President, the fee skyrocketed to N4,200 with the promise and assurance from the Management that certificates would be considered and handed over to the students because with it, it is easier for students to begin their own entrepreneurial journey of becoming useful to themselves and to the community that produced them.
Meanwhile, I could remember we were inaugurated on February 1, 2017, some months pass the date of resumption and the new EED payment had circulated and was embraced by the students and to which majority had paid, a move I believe that the Management was strategic and smart about and then, about 70% of the students had paid and by the time we came in, it was a knotty task for us to undo what had been done and which we accepted in good faith and paid for the service with the conviction certificates would be issued out to students.
Having said that the fee was hiked from N500 to N4,200 about 740% increase came to be as when you calculate the percentage increase, it would be:
% increase = N4,200 – N500 = N3,700.
% increase = increase/original amount x 100
% increase = 3,700 x 100/500 = 740%
For crying out loud, 740%! and we didn’t complain and students paid and till now, we haven’t seen any certificate!
But like the popular saying that “you don’t change the rules when the game has started” and throughout our staying in School and after graduating, we are still yet to get what we paid for and moreover, if you set a goal as Management and there is a fallout of your plans by not meeting targets, I sincerely believe that the students deserve to be apologized to! Schools must learn to take responsibility and respect the psychology of our students too!
When Schools are dealing with school fees, when you don’t meet up the demand of Institutions, you are prevented from writing examination or your result is being withheld, a move I feel is good only when there is balance to it.
If for instance, there is a brigandage around the School premises while fighting for their rights, Schools are fast to compel students to pay “reparation fee” because students fall out in taking responsibility at their end but it is only in Nigeria that I see Management being on the winning side! They are never considered wrong and most Institutions don’t like to take responsibility, all the blames are usually on the students, an act I consider imbalanced!
Students’ feelings need to be respected and for every professional negligence by School Authorities, students should be compensated too as what is good for the goose should as well be good for the gander! and the more reason I decided to kick against this hike in School fees and EED!
In my little years of being a Unionist, I’ve seen that increment most of the time are usually permitted when new governments are coming in which I believe is because they are fresh blood, these young Comrades are barely fitting their feet in the position they have been saddled with because they know little about what they are about involving with.
One thing School Managements would not do is enter an agreement with evidential paper works useable at the court of law and if there had always been, things like this won’t happen as the time is now to keep asking after the accountability of how students’ money are productively utilized, the more reason the current Students’ Union body of TOPS needs to wake up and be alive to their responsibilities.
Many management of sister Institutions know students are easily deceived with words of mouth but it is high time Students’ Union body of Schools start raising machinery and different mechanisms to make Schools as well be more alive to their responsibilities! We need to see the productivity of how our money is prudently utilized!
I am a business man and many of us I believe, and it is often wise to put all your ideas and talks in the economic term!
Hypothetically, if N3,000 is collected from just 2,000 students, you are going to be having about 3,000 x 2,000 = 6,000,000. That is approximately 6 million naira.
I am not saying this is what TOPS is collecting but anyone could do the mathematics himself/herself and get the same answers.
If I do a business of about 3 months (a semester) and heap up 6 million and the cost of production is about 2. 5million (which might not be possible for EED), should I not be contented nitori Olorun? But Schools would find every means to run dry pockets of our students and the basic free education we are promised by the government doesn’t become free afterwards! And the attitude I sincerely would want Schools to stop is treating students as if they are doing them a big favour!
Without lecturers, there would be no students and without students, there would be no lecturers! Hence, both parties should see themselves as being there for each other as the popular saying goes “education is a not a privilege, but a right” and when these agreements are breached, i.e. when students are not seeing what is tantamount to what they paid for, the more reason they go on protest! And if they protest, students are considered hooligans and made to pay reparation fees!
So unfair, really unfair.
HOW EED CAME TO BE/WHAT’S OBTAINABLE IN OTHER SISTER INSTITUTIONS
By the grace of God, I conversed with Presidents of two sister institutions here in Ibadan to sample what is obtainable in their own School.
President of the Polytechnic Ibadan, President/Senator Tony Bayonle Akadiri (Comrade) confirmed to me that freshers are paying N2,850 and the President of the Federal School of Statistics, President/Senator Tony (Comrade) confirmed to me as well that N3,000 is charged for HND 1 students.
I also conversed with a very good friend of mine who funny enough happened to do her National Diploma at The Polytechnic Ibadan, Saki Campus before finally doing Direct Entry to Olabisis Onabanjo University and I asked her how much students pay for EED, and she confirmed to me they pay “N500” only. Then I exclaimed “why are Polytechnics charging outrageous fees!”
NBTE SYLLABUS AND STUDENTS’ PAYMENT – A close insight
Let me say this that for the purpose of this, I made a little research by downloading the syllabus of NBTE, the body responsible for Technical Education in Nigeria.
According to the Nation Newspaper, posted on The Nation Online platform with the caption NBTE TIES ENTREPRENEURSHIP TO ACCREDITATION posted by one MEDINAT KANABE on the 18th of April, 2013 gave insights to how entrepreneurship came to be and how we come to have them in our various curriculums today.
You can click on this link to see for yourself (http://
While reporting, Medinat Kanabe was reported to have quoted Abdu Kofarmata (Officer in Charge of Entrepreneurship Programme and Education, National Board of Technical Education – NBTE) during capacity building programme on entpreneurship education for Rectors, Provosts and head of Institutions held at the Covenant University, Ota that “any Polytechnic that does not offer entrepreneurship programme and education will not be accredited because entrepreneurship programme allow for innovations and inventions and you cannot have a sustainable economy growth without innovation which is the key aim of establishing Polytechnics”. He also noted that “the actual aim of this workshop is to sensitize the Rectors on what we want to achieve with entrepreneurship programmes in Polytechnics and the role we want them to play in the discharge of the project”.
The main reason why Entrepreneurship education was floated ab initio into Polytechnic curriculum as at that time was primarily because of “accreditational threat” by NBTE and the goal of ensuring that “Polytechnic graduates can walk into a reality of carrying out innovations like Prof. Korede Ayo, Vice-Chancellor, Covenant University (as at that time) rightly said that “we just need a business incubator where Polytechnic graduates can walk into to carryout innovations no matter how small”.
The main purpose of floating entrepreneurship was because of looking for how to grow the economy through the inputs of prospective entrepreneurs who could start up a business no matter how small! But our Schools/Institutions have commercialized this and turned it into a business venture as most of them now charge outrageous amount of money for what was floated for the students to equip them, it isn’t fair, it isn’t at all!
WHAT ARE THE INDICES FOR THE INCREMENT OF THE EED & SCHOOL FEES
What are the indices for the continual hike? What are the reasons why prices are hiked? Schools and Institutions should consider the economic status of the students too!
People would even pay when the facilities have been upgraded as what is obtainable in many Polytechnics doesn’t just worth the fees students are paying. Most Institutions are experts in using inferior cost of production while charging much.
CLASS SIZE/STUDENTS-RATIO
The class size/students – tutor ratio needs to be balanced and looked into too. We don’t just want to keep paying for standards and not granted what we are paying for. Hypothetically, we have different Polytechnics using the ratio of 100 – 150 students to 1 tutor; 100:1 or 150:1 and this is not standard at all and even the more reason we want Schools to look into this and consider students too!
According to the agreeable world class size obtained from https://
All we are saying is that, the students can even pay more if basic standards are met! How many ratio of students per EED Tutor does TOPS operate, it’s a question which would be answered by their own statistics!
NOT COPYING THE OFFICE OF THE PRESIDENT AND THE SPEAKER
One thing I will never look down is OUR UNION. For the memo to have been served different offices and not the SUE/SRC is questionable and is worth asking for apologies to the leader of the students community in TOPS as that negligence is aberrant to what the Union stands for! It’s left for the current SUE/SRC to be acquainted with enough knowledge of what makes up students’ unionism.
N1,000 Farm Practice
I am still yet to understand where farm practice fee come in Entrepreneurial Education. I didn’t do any farm practice and I wouldn’t know if it’s a new course, fine, no problem but charging N1,000 for it is what is not the best! I stand to be corrected that NBTE is responsible for the floating of courses for Polytechnics and having checked their site and all other information at my disposal, no where did I come across farm practice (I STAND TO BE CORRECTED AND MAY BE WRONG)! And floating this is another means of taking money from students with no assurance of getting the best like the one of certificates that wasn’t treated! Anybody could mean this move to be a strategic one to add up so that when there is a negotiation, they could still arrive at their own figure which is not just right.
WHAT WE WANT TOPS TO DO FOR THE STUDENTS AND THE LINGERING ACCREDITATION SAGA
We know this is not a directive from the office of the Governor and we believe the Management still have the power to do the needful by reconsidering the fees fixed.
We have witnessed here in Oyo State where the Management of Institutions enters an MOU with students not to increase School fees for period of years, TOPS Polytechnic could make this possible too.
We need and implore the School Management of TOPS to do the needful! Help us to please drastically reduce the fees even if not to N500 like Olabisi Onabanjo University but to N2,500 – N3,000 obtainable in other sister institutions. And the school fees of the students of ND I, ND II, HND I and HND II reduced so students can pay on time.
We all know what the economy is saying as things are hard for people.
And to the accreditation, we want the Management to be speedy as we want to be mobilized by next batch after staying off School for more than 1 year and our resolution at the last meeting held to this respect is that, by November/December, accreditation issue will be a thing of the pass, an agreement we are closely watching by.
The most interesting part is, I cannot live all my life a student but my body will always react when I see injustice, I don’t just and will never condone it!
Thank you.
Viva Aluta!
Comrade Komolafe, Dare Emmanuel
Ex-presdient, SUG TOPS,
+2347056587444
kedunited@gmail.com
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