The Federal Government has expanded Nigeria’s national tertiary education ranking framework to cover universities, polytechnics, and colleges of education, making participation compulsory for all tertiary institutions across the country.
According to a statement by the Special Adviser (Media and Communications), Ikharo Attah, the Minister of Education, Dr. Maruf Tunji Alausa, announced this on Tuesday in Abuja during a meeting with the Nigerian Universities Ranking Advisory Committee (NURAC).
The minister said the committee would now be known as the Nigerian Tertiary Education Ranking Advisory Committee, following the expansion of its mandate.
Alausa said the expanded framework was part of President Bola Tinubu’s education reforms under the Renewed Hope Agenda, being implemented through the Nigeria Education Sector Renewal Initiative (NESRI).
According to him, the ranking exercise would strengthen quality, accountability, institutional performance, and global competitiveness across Nigeria’s tertiary education system.
He said the framework would provide institutions with clear benchmarks to assess their performance, identify areas requiring improvement, and measure progress, while encouraging healthy competition.
Alausa announced that the 2026/2027 ranking exercise for universities would commence in September, while the committee would determine the timeline for extending the exercise to polytechnics and colleges of education.
He added that the Federal Government would provide funding through the Tertiary Education Trust Fund (TETFund), develop guidelines to institutionalise the exercise, and formally communicate to vice-chancellors and heads of other tertiary institutions that participation was compulsory.
Speaking earlier, the Minister of State for Education, Professor Suwaiba Sa’id Ahmad, described the initiative as a significant step toward strengthening accountability and quality across the tertiary education sector.
She said healthy competition would encourage institutions to assess their performance, address identified gaps, and continuously improve the quality of education they provide.
Suwaiba stressed that both public and private institutions should participate in the ranking exercise, saying it would provide a mechanism for establishing and maintaining minimum standards across the sector.
Also speaking, Emeritus Professor Peter Okebukola, Chairman of the Nigerian Universities Ranking Advisory Committee and former Executive Secretary of the National Universities Commission, said the committee’s engagement with the minister followed a memorandum congratulating the Tinubu administration over the increasing number of Nigerian universities gaining global recognition.
Okebukola said the committee had also called for greater investment in university education to accelerate the progress recorded by Nigerian institutions.
He said the minister’s response went beyond the committee’s initial proposal, leading to the expansion of NURAC’s mandate to include polytechnics and colleges of education.
Okebukola expressed optimism that sustained investment, stronger institutional capacity, and the new national ranking framework would enable more Nigerian tertiary institutions to make significant progress in international rankings.
Alausa assured the committee and stakeholders that the Ministry of Education would provide the policy direction, funding, and capacity-building support required to make the ranking exercise credible, sustainable, and impactful.
He said the ministry would work with the committee to facilitate in-service training and institutional capacity-building programmes across tertiary institutions.
Packaged by Dare Raji
