The news from JAMB dominated the headlines this morning, and understandably so, because it touches millions of students and, by extension, their parents and relatives. Yet amid the deluge of details, one line refused to let me go: “No more UTME for education and agriculture courses.” In essence, it is a quiet proclamation of _let my people go Just walk into the university, college of education, or college of agriculture of your choice and study what feeds minds and bellies without the usual gauntlet.
On the surface, it looks like official recognition of two fields that exist in a paradox. Students often recoil from education and agriculture, yet these are among Nigeria’s largest employers of labor. It is ironic that while almost everyone starts with teaching during NYSC, given how vacancies are advertised almost monthly, and while more people now proudly call themselves farmers, society still has not embraced these courses with the mass patronage they deserve. The blessing is everywhere, but the celebration is muted.
“I am a teacher,” or “I am a farmer,” used to be one of the most modest expressions a person could make, the kind of statements that demanded courage, principle, and sincerity. You don’t say that to girls or to potential in-laws.
My friend once told me how surprised he was when he approached the parents of a girl who were both teachers. Being a teacher himself, he assumed it would create instant solidarity, a silent nod that would make the rest of the conversation easy. Instead, the eyes of the would-be in-laws turned red the moment he announced his profession. The question that followed cut deeper than he expected: “How can you take care of her as a teacher?”
That moment captures what sociologists call the _status inconsistency_ described by Gerhard Lenski, where a person’s occupational role does not align with the social prestige society assigns it. It also echoes Pierre Bourdieu’s idea of symbolic capital. Teaching and farming possess immense use value, but they lack the exchange value that confers social honor in Nigeria’s status hierarchy.
People may not line up to read these courses in school, yet almost everyone passes through teaching at some point, especially as the country grapples with a surge in unemployment. Research by the National Bureau of Statistics consistently shows that agriculture and education remain the largest absorbers of labor, often informally, even when they are not the first choice in career preference. A 2022 study by Ogunyemi and Adebayo on youth employment attitudes found that while 68% of Nigerian graduates avoided agriculture and education as first-choice courses, over 40% had engaged in either farming or teaching for income within two years of graduation. The market, it seems, knows what the prestige economy refuses to admit.
It is equally fascinating that farming doesn’t require C.V to practice. As the cost of living rises and white-collar jobs shrink, more young Nigerians are returning to the land, not out of desperation alone, but out of calculation. Agricultural economists like Akinwumi Adesina have long argued that agriculture is the sleeping giant of African economies that is low on glamour, high on sustenance.
And in the quiet calculus of life and marriage, teachers and farmers often emerge as the most available and dependable men around for women looking to settle down. The joke writes itself, but the reality is rooted in stability, presence, and the kind of work that does not vanish with a company restructuring.
So perhaps JAMB is not lowering standards as much as it is recognizing a blessing that has always been there. By removing the UTME barrier for education and agriculture, the board is aligning policy with a truth society has been slow to acknowledge: that the people who teach our children and feed our nation are not fallbacks. They are foundations.
Thus, every society reveres what it cannot live without, even when it pretends otherwise. Maybe this is the moment we stop pretending.
*Bagudu Mohammed*
bagudumohammed15197@gmail.com
