JAMB recently quietly dropped a bombshell; out of the 1.9 million candidates who sat for the 2025 UTME, over 1.5 million scored below 200. That’s a whopping 78%. Just 12,000 students (0.63%) scored above 300. It’s the kind of data that should keep any education policymaker awake at night, but for the average Nigerian, it’s just another depressing stat in an already messy system.
Oh, and if you’re tempted to console yourself with WAEC results, don’t. In Lagos alone, over 30,000 public school students failed the 2024 WAEC exams. This, despite the Lagos State Government pumping ₦1.58 billion into covering registration fees. A 54.3% failure rate, funded by taxpayer money.
These numbers are not just statistics, they’re a mirror. And what we’re seeing in that mirror is an education system that is not only broken, but bleeding out.
But This Isn’t Really About Exams
You’ve probably seen the headlines and the press statements, the numbers are out there, JAMB has explained, WAEC has released, the commissioners have briefed. But what nobody seems to be asking is: why is this happening over and over again?
What we’re facing is not just a student problem; It’s a system problem, an attitude problem, a leadership problem, a generational problem. We’ve normalised failure, blamed Gen Z, moved on, as usual
But have we really stopped to ask ourselves what kind of future we’re building when 78% of our university hopefuls can’t score halfway on a 400-point scale? The truth is, even those who “pass” often do so by cramming, guessing, or sheer luck. Not by comprehension or creativity or even competence.
The System Is Churning Out Empty Certificates
Walk into many secondary schools in Nigeria and ask students why they’re studying. You’ll hear: “So I can pass WAEC,” “So I can enter university,” or worse, “So I can japa.” Education has become a stepping stone to escape, not to transform.
And it’s easy to see why. What’s the reward for learning in Nigeria? Even first-class graduates are hawking perfumes and running POS shops. The correlation between education and a decent life has eroded so badly, it’s now a joke.
But here’s the danger: when a nation begins to view knowledge as useless, it is planting the seeds of its own downfall. You can’t TikTok your way out of a bad economy. You can’t “influencer” your way into national development.
Let’s Talk About the Teachers Too
Before we lay all the blame on “lazy students” or “phone addicts,” let’s talk about the people who teach them. Most teachers in Nigeria are underpaid, under-trained, and uninspired. Many can’t even operate the CBT systems their students are tested on.
What exactly are we expecting them to produce? If a teacher can’t spell “entrepreneurship” or explain basic civic concepts, what do you expect their students to become? If the foundation is faulty, the building will collapse. Every time.
Reform Isn’t Enough, We Need Reinvention
This isn’t a time for band-aid solutions. It’s time to completely reimagine what education should mean in Nigeria. We don’t need more memorization. We need minds that can solve, think, build, and question.
Some things that must change, starting now:
- Audit and Retrain Teachers: Every teacher should be re-evaluated, retrained, or respectfully removed.
- Teach Thinking, Not Just Topics: Introduce critical thinking, media literacy, and logic into our classrooms.
- Reward Creativity and Curiosity: Stop reducing education to exam scores. Start celebrating ideas.
- Connect Curriculum to Reality: Teach financial literacy, emotional intelligence, civic responsibility, and digital skills.
- Rebuild Community Involvement: Make parents, churches, mosques, and communities part of the learning ecosystem.
This Is Why Inside Success Nigeria Exists
At Inside Success Nigeria (ISN), we believe the solution isn’t only in policy papers or billion-naira budgets. It’s in empowering young people with real tools, relevant knowledge, and radical confidence.
Every webinar, interview, and story we share is about reprogramming the mindset that says, “school na scam.” We showcase creators, entrepreneurs, writers, coders, chefs, fashion designers; young people who are using their knowledge to build real futures.
Because while the system may be failing, young Nigerians don’t have to.
ISN is here to help bridge the gap between school and skills. Between dreams and direction. Between frustration and empowerment.
So, the next time you see another depressing stat, don’t just sigh and scroll, ask: What can I do? What can we change? How can we empower? Because it’s not just UTME or WAEC that’s on the line, it’s our future.
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