Gombe State Ministry of Education, yesterday, rewarded 24 students with the highest scores in this year’s Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME) supervised by Joint Admission and Matriculation Board (JAMB).

The Guardian reports that more than 70 per cent of Nigerian students scored lower than 200 marks in this year’s examination across the country. Following the development, the state celebrated the 24 students of Government Day Science 2 Secondary School, Gombe, who scored above 200 marks with awards and cash prizes.

During the celebration, the state Commissioner for Education, Aishatu Maigari, stated the gesture was intended to encourage academic excellence in the state and motivate other students to be studious and make the state proud.

She attributed the achievement to a partnership between the Ministry of Education and Pen Resource Academy under the Students Work Study Programme (SWSP), where science students received special training and mentoring.

The commissioner expressed delight in the students’ performance, noting that it was a testament to the effectiveness of the state’s education initiatives.

Maigari enumerated some of the initiatives introduced by the state government under the administration of Governor Inuwa Yahaya to reform the education sector to include declaration of a state of emergency in education, coupled with policies such as mock exams and payment of Senior Secondary Certificate Examination (SSCE) fees for students, who passed the mock exams.

She stated that the initiatives yielded positive results as over 600 students across the state met the requirements for admissions into tertiary institutions last year as against 2019 ‘when only 22 per cent of students in the state passed the SSCE.

Our correspondent reports that during the ceremony, the commissioner unveiled a special billboard at the school’s gate with pictures of the high-scoring JAMB students as a mark of honour.