By Abdussamad Isah
I have just learned that you’ve already started taking lectures a few weeks ago. Indeed, that’s quite interesting! However, as an ardent old student of Kano Poly, who have had spent nearly five years tutoring students, I see the need of penning something for you.
First and foremost, Kano State Polytechnic is a mysterious school. No matter how one tries to explain it—and the wishy-washy people in it—for you, as a fresher, you could hardly grasp 50% until, perhaps, you spend a semester or two taking lecture in it.
The biggest fears that occasionally come to one’s mind when they got the admission in Kano Poly are usually two(2): the “lecturers” and the issue of “withdrawal”. Let me briefly highlight you something about them and how to deal with them.
1. The Lecturers: been it a college and not a university, it’s staffs—both academics and non-academic—are predominantly young men, and they are mostly Ph.D and MSC holders (there’s a few HND/Degree holders, though). Moreover, most of them studied their NDs and HNDs there.
Nevertheless, their only ambition is to give students qualitative education so they can use it any time they wish; that’s why they hate to come by a lazy student or those that accept the idea of “read and pass the level”. To them [Lecturers], a student must read (not only what he/she was taught at school, or what is in the course outline, but beyond) hard, as if he/she is a Ph.D student. Besides, each of them have their rules and regulations.
Thus, as a new student, if you want to succeed, you must attend the lectures regularly before the lecturer (as you often can’t be allow to enter after them), and follow the lecturer’s rules and regulations. After all, one has to pray hard.
2. The Issue of Withdraw: of course, Kano Poly, especially School of Management Studies (SMS), do withdraw students. In fact, to say the above statement maybe an understatement. Because, I could remember vividly when our first result was released, nearly 100 students out of 250 were withdrawn, while almost 50 students were in probation.
But this had happened for a reason—not having a CA. Some of them got their admissions a week or two to exams, when most, if not all, the lecturers had finished their CAs and covered their courses; while, of course, some had CAs but, due to their laziness, failed to score as expected.
Therefore, advisibly, if you know you got your admission late, just drop the whole semester and wait for the next—second semester.
Nonetheless, one has to be very careful about the issue of malpractice. You should read the regulations governing conduct of examinations thoroughly. Make sure you perused them all. My friend was caught and withdrawn on the day of our graduation. It’s so sad indeed. But had he not ignore the rules, he would had graduated on that day.
May we be guided, amin.
Yours, Abdussamad
