Higher degrees with tears

Dr Jacob Danlami (not real names) was offered admission in 2005 to read for a Master of Arts degree in one of the courses at the Ahmadu Bello University’s Faculty of Arts. The Master of Arts programme in any of the courses is a 24-month programme – under normal circumstances. However, Mr Danlami is now […]

Dr Jacob Danlami (not real names) was offered admission in 2005 to read for a Master of Arts degree in one of the courses at the Ahmadu Bello University’s Faculty of Arts. The Master of Arts programme in any of the courses is a 24-month programme – under normal circumstances. However, Mr Danlami is now in his sixth year and there is no sign of when he is likely to complete the programme and obtain this higher degree.

“My major problem and that of  many of my type here, is the rumour we are hearing that the Post-Graduate School has given up to the end of last month (June 2011) for all students who have overstayed to complete their programme or risk withdrawal. This is July (2011) and we are still here, largely for no fault of ours. I don’t have any problem with my course work because I was able to finish that within the stipulated one year. The problem is with my thesis. As you know, my supervisor is my teacher and he deserves my respect but, honestly speaking, he is a very busy person. For that, it takes us time before we can set our eyes on him,” Mr Danlami said.

He added that his predicament of overrunning the normal period of his MA, aside that of his ever-busy supervisor, can be attributed to a number of factors.

“When we were about to finish our Course Work, that crises of SU’s (Professor Shehu Uthman Abdullahi) proposed increase in school fees broke out. That made us to lose about one year doing nothing at home. On resumption, my first major supervisor went on sabbatical leave. That cost me another year. When the man returned from his sabbatical, I hardly saw him and whenever I was lucky to see him, he would not give me proper attention. I have now submitted my last chapter of the thesis and, I hope to have internal defense this month (July), that is, if the threat of the PG school is anything to go by,” frustrated-looking Danlami said.

Many of Mr Danlami’s mates are all over the ABU. Most of the postgraduate students who are having the problem of overstaying are the ones undergoing the academic postgraduate programmes that are M.Sc, M.A and PhD, our investigations revealed. M.Sc and MA are supposed to be 24-months programmes, while PhD is supposed to be a 36-month programme.

Sunday Trust further found that those undergoing these academic postgraduate courses are usually subjected to rigorous processes, unlike their counterparts who are undergoing professional courses like the Masters in International Studies and Diplomacy (MIAD), Masters in Public Administration (MPA), Masters in Business Administration (MBA) etcetera.

Some students alleged that because of the caliber of people who are enrolled into the professional programmes, the students are usually given a “soft-landing”.

“As you know, because of the Nigerian factor, a class that ministers, governors, senators, senior army officers are attending is likely to get a special treatment. Even from their school fees, you would know that those courses are for big men. Apart from that, those professional students have a way of manoeuvering their ways. There was a time we heard that a student of one of those professional classes bought GSM handsets for all his lecturers. This was when GSM was GSM. Although, we also learnt that some of the lecturers had refused to collect the gift. Nevertheless, this is to tell you that students of professional courses are having upper hand compared to some of us who hardly feed twice in a day,” Mr Danlami said.

Malam Sani Uthman is another postgraduate student who was not able to endure the alleged “frustration” that supervisors mete out on their students.

“Some students don’t know their right. If a supervisor is not giving you attention, a student has right to complain formally to the Head of Department who would either call the supervisor to order or assign another one for the student. I was given admission in the year 2008. Having completed my Course Work, I submitted my proposal to my major supervisor, who is a professor. The man approved the proposal and I began my research. We continued the research but when I submitted my chapter three, then the man asked me to go back to square zero by changing my topic, chapter one and two.

“I couldn’t bear that. I went to complain to our HOD and after investigation, another senior lecturer was assigned to continue with me. I have now finished my programme and I am waiting for my result. Though I finished within three years, instead of two, you cannot compare me with those who have spent six, seven or even ten years doing a two-year or three-year programme,” Malam Uthman said.

The story is the same at the University of Jos, Jos, Plateau State. There, Mercy L. Garba, a PG student in the Management Sciences blamed the departments as well as the PG school for wasting much time before they call for project proposal defence in the first place, or thesis defence.

“When you submit your project proposal, it takes a longer time before you are asked to come and defend it. When you do your proposal defence, it takes a longer time before you are called to come and do your proposal. In most cases, the supervisors assigned to students are the culprits. Some would only attend to you at their leisure time which, inevitably, extends the duration of your course.”

She further alleged that “some supervisors, when they don’t like your face, will be pushing you around without any reason. They can even cancel every work submitted to them.”

She, however, admitted that the course work doesn’t take much longer time for them to finish.

However, for the Secretary to the ABU postgraduate school, Malam Bashir Abubakar, 70 percent of the problems of students overstaying their postgraduate courses emanate from students.

“There are many problems which the students would not tell you. Most students of nowadays are either very lazy or they don’t have time for their programme. In ABU, we try to maintain standards. Therefore, postgraduate courses are not something a student will just attempt to do anyhow and you expect our lecturers to pass him or her. A postgraduate student has to be thorough in his research and a lazy person or somebody who doesn’t have time for his research cannot be thorough.

“Another problem is that of students abandoning their courses. We have records of many students who have abandoned their courses. Some of these students applied for admission because they don’t have anything doing and, if during their programme, they happen to get jobs, they would naturally abandon the course. After some years, when they settle down at their jobs, they would now come back to say that they want to continue. This is why you would find that some students are not even updating the records of their school fees. There are a lot of problems that postgraduate students bring upon themselves and because they must accuse somebody for their failure, they push the blame on their supervisors.

“On the contrary, it may interest you to know that some of these students tie down their supervisors because the number of postgraduate students supervised by a lecturer is part of his assessment. Then, how would you expect somebody to sabotage his own progress? It is also in the open that when a supervisor is given 10 students to supervise and five, six or seven graduate on time, you would know that there is a problem with the remaining ones,” Malam Abubakar said.

Despite the obvious problems that the postgraduate students bring to themselves in hindering the smooth running of their programmes, Malam Abubakar said the postgraduate school has come up with some measures to check the excesses of the students and the lecturers.

“We would now have a register,” he said, “where students, their supervisors and HODs would be signing. Anytime a student goes to see his supervisor, the student will sign the register, the supervisor will sign and the HOD will also sign. In the case that a student goes to see his supervisor and the supervisor is either not around or he has refused to see the student, the student will sign the register and take it to the HOD to sign. This will help us check the issue of not seeing supervisors as everything will be on record. This will also enable us withdraw those students who unnecessaryly delay their stay in their programmes.”

Also, according to the Dean, School of Post-Graduate studies, University of Jos, Professor Warisu Oyesina Alli, who admitted that in many cases, students don’t graduate within the stipulated period given for course, the problems that result to that are many. He blamed the instability in academic calendar, crisis (in Jos), lack of commitment on the part of students, political instability, strike actions as well as lack of good governance.

“We try, largely, to comply with the stipulated advertised post-graduate duration, but sometimes, the major problem that we have faced has had to do with instability in the university academic calendar, the kind of social disruption that we have experienced. Particularly, in our own environment here, I mean in fact, in the last couple of years, there have been a lot of socio-economic and political destructions as a result of conflicts. For those, many times the university had to close and all these have a bearing on the duration.”

But the problem, according to Professor Alli, is not only related to the issue of disruption of academic calendar alone, as said, students have their own share of the blame.  “Students will just disappear without doing the mandatory research project component of the programme after the course work,” he alleged.

Professor Alli also lamented that most of the regular post-graduate programmes are full time programmes, but many of the students on full-time employment register for post-graduate full time programme. They will not be able to complete it in time.

“Even their attendance is erratic. They manage all the same, but the course work component is usually not important. It is doing the research project component that is most important.  We do advise students that just as they are finishing their course work component, they must sit down and finish their research projects.”

In spite of the problems highlighted, the number of post-graduates students in the university is in “hundreds, from all the faculties: environmental, education, arts, pharmacy, social sciences, natural sciences, law, etc all the faculties in the entire departments run postgraduate programmes, apart from the new departments that we are just bringing up,” the dean said.

According to him, a substantial number do graduate, “but we have some who are unable to graduate because, maybe, they have carry over courses or they have not been able to finish their course work and things like that.”  The Dean added that during the last convocation which took place early this year, many post-graduate students actually graduated.

He added, “like our PhD programme, almost every day we are conducting PhD viva. Today, (July 7th, 2011) we conducted, yesterday (July 6th, 2011) we conducted, tomorrow (July 8th, 2011) we are conducting and it’s always like that.”

Some of the ways to address the issues, according to the professor, depends largely on the quality of governance, which affects the way institutions of learning are being run. He pointed out that the issue of funding plays a significant role.