FG makes tertiary institution ranking compulsory for universities, polytechnics, colleges of education
The Federal Government has made participation in Nigeria’s national tertiary education ranking exercise compulsory for all universities, polytechnics and colleges of education.
The Minister of Education, Dr Tunji Alausa, announced this on Tuesday in Abuja during a meeting with the Nigerian Universities Ranking Advisory Committee, which has now been expanded and renamed the Nigerian Tertiary Education Ranking Advisory Committee.
Alausa said the expanded ranking framework was designed to promote “quality, accountability, institutional performance and global competitiveness” across Nigeria’s tertiary education system.
According to him, the ranking will provide institutions with clear benchmarks for assessing their performance, identifying areas that require improvement and measuring progress, while also encouraging healthy competition among institutions.
Under the new arrangement, universities, polytechnics and colleges of education will be assessed under a unified national ranking framework, with the Federal Government expected to fund the exercise through the Tertiary Education Trust Fund.
Alausa said the 2026/2027 ranking exercise for universities would commence in September, while the committee would determine an appropriate timeline for extending the exercise to polytechnics and colleges of education.
He added that the government would develop guidelines to institutionalise the exercise and formally communicate to vice-chancellors and heads of other tertiary institutions that participation was compulsory.
The minister said the policy formed part of President Bola Tinubu’s education reforms under the Renewed Hope Agenda, being implemented through the Nigeria Education Sector Renewal Initiative.
He also pledged that the Federal Ministry of Education would provide the policy direction, funding and capacity-building support required to make the ranking exercise credible, sustainable and impactful.
According to him, the ministry would work with the committee to facilitate in-service training and institutional capacity-building programmes across tertiary institutions, with the aim of enabling more Nigerian institutions to gain global recognition.
The Minister of State for Education, Prof. Suwaiba Ahmad, described the initiative as a significant step towards strengthening accountability and quality across Nigeria’s tertiary education system.
Ahmad said healthy competition was essential to encouraging institutions to assess their performance, address identified gaps and consistently improve the quality of education they provide.
She also stressed that the ranking should cover both public and private institutions, saying it would provide a mechanism for establishing and maintaining minimum standards across the sector.
She said the exercise would help institutions understand their strengths and weaknesses and drive measurable improvements as Nigeria’s tertiary education system continues to expand.
Chairman of the ranking advisory committee and former Executive Secretary of the National Universities Commission, Emeritus Prof Peter Okebukola, said the committee’s engagement with Alausa followed a memorandum congratulating the Tinubu administration on the increasing number of Nigerian universities gaining recognition in global rankings.
Okebukola said the committee had also called for greater investment in university education to accelerate the progress.
He noted that Alausa’s response went beyond the committee’s initial proposal by expanding the mandate of the Nigerian Universities Ranking Advisory Committee to include polytechnics and colleges of education.
The development led to the transformation of NURAC into the Nigerian Tertiary Education Ranking Advisory Committee.
Okebukola expressed optimism that sustained investment, stronger institutional capacity and the new national ranking framework would enable more Nigerian institutions to make significant progress in international rankings.
He said the framework would help Nigerian institutions compete confidently with leading institutions globally.