The Ministry of Education (MoE), following high demand for Category A Senior High Schools in the school placement system, has denied allegations that it plans to downgrade such schools to Category B status.
The Education Ministry clarification comes after several news outlets reported that the Minister for Education, Haruna Iddrisu, has said the top-tier second-cycle schools next year will be downgraded to Category B status.
The news outlets reported that the Ministry will downgrade 10 Category A schools to Category B status, while another 10 Category B schools will be upgraded to Category A, a move, they quoted the Minister for Education, saying, “it will be supported with significant infrastructure investment to ensure equity and balance in school placements.”
Speaking at a press briefing at the Ministry on Tuesday, 14 October, they said Haruna Iddrisu noted that the current placement system has created intense competition for limited spaces in a few elite schools.
“With about 393,000 students competing for only 76,000 available spaces in our top schools, it has become difficult to ensure equity and transparency in the placement process,” he said.
The news outlets indicated that he explained that the restructuring will ease the pressure on the existing Category A schools, which receive the highest number of placement requests every year, leading to public concern over fairness in the process.
They said the Minister stated that the government will begin investing in new classroom blocks, dormitories, and science laboratories in the selected schools to ensure the upgraded institutions meet the standards required of Category A schools. This, he stressed, will help spread placement opportunities and reduce overconcentration in a handful of schools.
But, speaking on JoyNews’ The Pulse on Tuesday, October 14, the Media Relations Officer for the Ministry, Hashim Mohammed, explained that the Minister’s earlier comments had been misinterpreted.
The spokesperson for the Education Ministry clarified that the government intends to invest heavily in infrastructure in both Category A and B schools to address the growing demand for placement.
“I think the Minister said we need to improve infrastructure in Category A schools, as well as upgrade some of the infrastructure in Category B schools, and elevate them to Category A schools. This is because the number of students who demand Category A schools is very high,” he noted.
He explained that while Category A schools have space for only 76,537 students, about 393,593 students qualify for admission, showing that there are far more students than available spaces.
“So you can see the discrepancy between the vacancy and the number of qualified students, simply because the government has not invested much in terms of infrastructure in the Category A schools,” he said.
The Education Minister’s spokesman further explained that four regions in the country currently have no Category A schools, and that the government is making plans to invest and improve infrastructure.
“The Minister never said they are going to downgrade Category A schools. He said the government needs to deploy more to improve infrastructure and upgrade some of the Category A schools so that they will be able to absorb more students, as well as elevate some of the Category B schools into Category A so that we can have a lot of Category A schools.”