Why Nigerian universities normally increase their tuition fees

Posted by Felix Okoli on Monday July 14, 2014 at 11:59:21:

The need to acquire higher institution in Nigeria has increased exponentially since more people are finding out that they need a higher education degree to get a decent job in the labour market, and as a result Universities, polytechnics and Colleges of Education produce thousands of graduates each year. For students in Nigerian universities, increment tuition fees is now a regular occurrence, the latest being the increment of tuition fees in Lagos State University (LASU), and students had to protest the improper hike in their school fees. This article will talk about reasons why Nigerian universities increase tuition fees;

1. Money To Maintain The School: Even though all the universities in Nigeria are funded by either the state or federal government, they still have need to raise more money to maintain the school. The reason for this may be because the money allocated to then by the government most times is not enough to cater for other responsibilities in the school, secondly with the ever increasing number of new students being admitted into the school, there is always need to raise money to build structures that will accommodate them all, and the only other way to do this is to increase student’s fee.

2. The Need for Money To Carryout Projects Inside The School: Universities are always involved in projects within the school, like renovation of dilapidated structures, construction of new hotels to accommodate the needs of the students, and all these projects require much money to float them, and most times, the only way to raise the huge amount needed to do this is by increasing student’s tuition fees. Using the incident that happened at Nnamdi Azikiwe University some back when the school had to raise money for the accreditation of most of the departments in school. They spent millions of naira for the exercise, and the had to had an extra N10,000 to students fees to recover the money

3. Rising cost of education: The cost of educating students tend to increase as a result of money losing value over a period of time and this is mostly common during inflation. Students might be made to bear a major cost of their education when the authorities increase their fees.