Recall the way you have different kinds of meat when you order a hot bowl of assorted pepper soup, that you most times cannot even tell the liver from the kidney or the kidney from the heart and so on the feeling lingers. A hot bowl of assorted pepper soup can now be intricately linked to the latest exam sitting arrangement in the prestigious Federal Polytechnic Oko, Anambra State.
Over a decade now the higher institution of learning has undergone a lot of changes, most necessary others we lose the right words to describe their essence to the positive growth of students. The Federal Polytechnic Oko cannot be left out in this acclaimed changes going on. Once acknowledged as the polytechnic of the moment in Nigeria, the polytechnic has witnessed diverse changes and growth under the management of their different Rectors.
Before the current rector, Dr. Francisca Nwafulugo came in, the Polytechnic former rector, Prof. Godwin Onu, took lots of drastic decisions and made more than a few impeccable changes in the polytechnic. Of all he said and did the elimination of cultism and the changing of the exam mode from pen on paper (POP) to a computer-based test (CBT), stood out. Students were most happy with the CBT mode of the exam as it reduced the rate of sorting of lecturers, made exams simpler and encouraged their lazy and lackadaisical attitude towards their studies.
Immediately after Prof. Godwin Onu exhausted his tenure in office and left, he ironically had not gotten to the school main gate before the then Ag Rector and current deputy rector Dr. Izuchukwu Onu reverted the mode of exam from computer-based test (CBT) to Paper on pen (POP), and the students almost set the school ablaze. After “all said and done” the POP model of exam was given an official chair as the boss, and CBT moved to the general office that only surfaced when called upon, as the school now only allows the use of CBT for General studies courses or borrowed courses examination which rarely ever occurred in most departments.
Just when the students of Federal Polytechnic Oko thought they had seen it all, boom! boom! boom! All round the school, the shaking sound was heard and felt, like a time bomb waiting to explode the new Rector Dr. Francisca Nwafulugo came in with her own policies, never seen or heard of in the history of the polytechnic, this policy leaves both the students and lecturers in awe and is still shaking the foundations of the polytechnic with its announcement and by fire by force kind of implementation.
While students were still complaining and rigorously campaigning that the “POP mode” of examination be changed back to CBT, Dr. Francisca not only put the proverbial golden coat on POP, she also made sure that no single department sat two on a seat. If there was ever a need for students to seat two or three in a sit, they must all be from three different departments. E.g. Mass Communication, EE, PAD. Students of the polytechnic started the exam agitated and ready to let hell loose if they are not allowed to sit the way they wanted but like them Dr. Francisca Nwafulugo came prepared with different security agents, to make sure that her policy was put in place without any form of uproar from the student.
He went further to threaten the student with expulsion or a carryover in their course if they failed to maintain order and quietly sit for the examinations. The Student on seeing the tense mood of the day quietly mellowed down and mixed like a bowl of assorted pepper soup to take their examination. Gold cannot be referred to as gold until it has passed through fire. With all said and done, and the back and forth movement the students of the Polytechnic are subjected to every semester. Students shouldn’t see it as stress, wickedness or punishment of some sort on the part of the management, but rather see it as a growing and toughening up period that would prepare them for better days ahead.