FG requires national rankings for universities, polytechnics and colleges of education

The Federal Government has introduced mandatory participation in the national tertiary rankings in Nigeria, expanding the initiative beyond universities to include polytechnics and colleges of education across the country.

The Minister of Education, Dr Tunji Alausa, announced the policy on Tuesday in Abuja at a meeting with the Nigerian University Rankings Advisory Committee, which has now been expanded and renamed the Nigerian Tertiary Education Rankings Advisory Committee.

According to Alausa, the broader ranking system is aimed at improving “quality, accountability, institutional performance and global competitiveness” across Nigeria’s higher education sector.

He said the exercise will provide institutions with “clear benchmarks to assess their performance, identify areas requiring improvement and measure progress,” while encouraging healthy competition among them.

Under the new framework, universities, polytechnics and colleges of education will operate within a unified national ranking system, and funding for its implementation is expected to come from the Tertiary Education Trust Fund.

Alausa said, “The 2026/2027 higher education ranking exercise will begin in September, while the committee will determine the appropriate time period to expand the ranking exercise to polytechnics and tertiary institutions.”

He further stated that “the government will develop guidelines to institutionalize this exercise and formally communicate to vice-chancellors and heads of other higher institutions that participation is a must.”

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The Education Minister said the initiative is part of President Bola Tinubu’s broader reforms in the education sector under the New Hope Agenda and the Nigerian Education Sector Reform Initiative.

He assured stakeholders that the Federal Ministry of Education will provide the necessary “policy direction, funding and capacity development support” to ensure that the exercise remains credible and sustainable.

Alausa added that the ministry would work with the advisory committee to facilitate “in-service training and institutional capacity building programs across tertiary institutions,” with the ultimate goal of helping more institutions in Nigeria achieve international recognition.

The Minister of Education, Professor Suwaiba Ahmad, also described the initiative as “a significant step towards strengthening accountability and quality across the Nigerian higher education system.”

He said competition between institutions was necessary to encourage continuous improvement and higher educational standards.

“Fair competition is essential to encourage institutions to assess their performance, address identified gaps and consistently improve the quality of education they provide,” he said.

Suwaiba emphasized that both public and private universities will be included in the ranking system, and emphasized that the effort will serve as an important mechanism for monitoring and maintaining minimum standards.

He added that this would allow institutions to identify their “strengths and weaknesses” while driving measurable progress in the rapidly growing higher education sector.

Meanwhile, Chairman of the advisory committee, Professor Emeritus Peter Okebukola, said the committee’s engagement with the minister followed an earlier memorandum congratulating the Tinubu administration on the increasing international recognition achieved by Nigerian universities.

Okebukola, former Executive Secretary of the National Universities Commission, said the committee also called for increased investment in university education to accelerate the progress already recorded.

However, he said Alausa broadened the scope of the committee’s initial proposal by expanding its responsibilities beyond universities to polytechnics and colleges of education.

The decision then led to the transformation of the Nigerian University Rankings Advisory Committee into the Nigerian Tertiary Education Rankings Advisory Committee.

Okebukola expressed confidence that “sustained investment, stronger institutional capacity and a new national ranking framework” will help more Nigerian tertiary institutions improve their standing internationally.

He said this initiative would enable Nigerian institutions to “compete confidently with leading institutions globally.”

This new policy comes at a time when Nigerian higher education institutions are under increasing pressure to improve their performance in international rankings, where research output, academic reputation, citations, international outlook and institutional resources remain key assessment factors.

Although more and more Nigerian universities are appearing in recent global rankings, challenges relating to inadequate funding, weak research capacity, infrastructure deficit and staff shortages continue to impact the competitiveness of these universities.

By expanding the ranking framework to polytechnics and colleges of education, the Federal Government hopes to establish a broader and more coordinated system for measuring the performance of institutions across the higher education sector.

The mandatory nature of the exercise also represents a significant change, as institutions are now expected to participate actively, submit relevant information and measure their performance against nationally established benchmarks.