How are standards fallen?

UB now admits four ‘O’ levels without English language

By Doh Bertrand Nua in Kumba

The University of Buea has finally waived a pass in GCE ‘O’ Level English as condition sine qua non for admission of English speaking students into the University. The University also now admits four GCE ‘O’ level subjects down from at least five subjects previously.

            The decision reviewing admission conditions for freshers at UB is contained in a 25 October 2017 release titled “Extension of deadline for undergraduate admissions”.

            Signed by the Deputy Vice-Chancellor in charge of Teaching, Professionalization and Development of Information and Communication Technologies, Prof. Blaise Mukoko, the release invites candidates who do not have a pass in English Language at GCE O/L to apply for admission.

            It noted that these non ‘O’ level English passers will be required to sit and pass an English language proficiency test that will be organised by the Department of English at a cost. It did not however state whether or not the candidates would take test before or after admission.

            In addition, the release also “encourages candidates with a pass in 4 papers (only) at the GCE O/L to apply for admission”. Before now, candidates for admission needed a pass in at least five ‘O’ level subjects including English language to merit admission into UB. 

            The stringent admission conditions at UB before today, was greeted by the public as salutary giving that it helped in upholding the high standards that were set for the essentially Anglo-Saxon University at its creation in 1993. The compulsory ‘O’ level English for example pushed prospective freshers to take their English lessons seriously and improve on their written and spoken English, especially at an era when the level of English was observed to be dropping in geometric progression.

            But the English requirement also posed a problem; it was considered discriminatory to English speaking students because their French-speaking counterparts with little or no proficiency in English were granted admission. 

            Before now only Francophone students had to sit the English proficiency test in order to gain admission, while their Anglophone counterparts needed a pass in GCE O/L English.  

            It was no surprise therefore that the Southwest Chiefs Conference in a recent release questioned why Anglophone students who have studied all along in the English language were denied admission because they failed ‘O’ level English, while their Francophone counterparts some of whom can neither speak nor write English were admitted into UB?

            Commentators believe that the waiver granted Anglophone students without a pass in ‘O’ level English is aimed to give them equal opportunity with their Francophone counterparts, even if it at once breeds mediocrity and only condones the rapidly falling standards of in most schools and at UB in particular.

It is however understood that entry conditions for undergraduates into UB might have been reviewed as a consequence of the Anglophone crisis which has kept students out of school for over a year running and maybe because of the far-from-encouraging results of the 2017 GCE.

The UB release also extended the deadline for registration of undergraduate students in some faculties to 9 November 2017.