NEW NOUN GOVERNMENT, FOR BETTER OR FOR WORSE?

The assumption of every new leadership is always characterized with innovations that such leadership brings to its subjects and subordinates. In the new leadership of National Open University of Nigeria led by Professor Abdallah Ubah Adamu upon the exit of Professor Vincent Ado Tenebe, one would need to take a deep analysis to ascertain whether or not there are positive changes in the present leadership as NOUN Students are found seeming to return to the previous government. A few of the struggles that NOUN students are going through are summarized below:

Remitta Challenge

Just while NOUN students were getting used to generating remitta codes in order to pay necessary fees, right now, the portals have been closed and students who have money to pay into their portals (even though not for this current semester), cannot do so.

Printing of Exam Registration Slips and Identity Cards

For students to gain entrance into examination halls, they would need to present their examination registration slips and identity cards. However, right now, the portals are closed and students cannot access their examination registration slips anymore. Students have been faced with so many "options" which are not even easily verifiable due to the endless posts seen online.

Call for students' presence in school centres

As if the above are not enough stress to NOUN students, they have been advised to visit their study centres before the commencement of examinations in order to enlist themselves for examinations and are expected to come with documents such as evidences of payments, passport photographs etc, in place of the exam registration slips and identity cards which some of them already have printed.

Inability to submit Tutor Marked Assignments (TMA)
After students have finished reading well enough to submit their TMAs, they woke up to the news that the site is unavailable and they therefore cannot submit their TMAs which constitute 30% of their total marks per semester. Though there have been unconfirmed reports that those who were unable to submit their TMAs will be scored 100% in their examinations, but, NOUN students deserve better. After paying so much money in the name of school fees and etc, they should be properly informed.

NOUN Media

Apart from the use of study centres and sometimes, the NOUN website, students are unsure where to go to or who to ask if and when things go wrong. The school website should be a hub for information. It should serve the needs of the students at all times. Students should not be made to "travel" to their study centres from their work places just to get information about their school and goings on thereat. 

Students are unaware of what is really wrong

Students are exasperated with this twist of events and the many rumors that fill the air of NOUN. This is therefore a clarion call to the management and the leadership of the school to lead the students well and to inform them well too. it is therefore not right for students to just wake up and realize that their sites are unaccessible and they all have to "scout" for information.

Is NOUN still an open and distant learning institution or it is gradually transforming itself into a conventional university?

The Motto of NOUN is "Work and Learn" and this guides students to believe that the system provides convenience for people to work and learn. The call for students to visit their study centres in order to verify their payments and registrations for examinations, which defect is no fault of theirs, makes one to wanna ask if NOUN is supposed to be a conventional university, considering the fact that the majority of the students are working class people who should not stake their jobs just because the school authority demands to see them for dutifully complying with the norms of the institution.

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