Ban smartphones in varsities – Don

The acting Dean of the Faculty of Agriculture, Al-Hikmah University, Ilorin, Kwara State, Dr Saeed Olorunnisola, has urged the federal and state governments to ban the use of smartphones in secondary and tertiary institutions.

Olorunnisola said the ban would enhance students’ concentration in class.

He stated this while delivering a paper at the Mission for the Eradication of Examination Malpractice’s second national symposium held in Osogbo, Osun State, on Saturday.

Olorunnisola, while speaking on the theme, ‘Effects of examination malpractices on education and national development,’ noted with dismay that social media had become a major impediment to students’ concentration even in secondary schools.

Social media is causing distraction in secondary schools. Tertiary institutions are the worst.  Students don’t care any longer. Some of them are taking photo shot of notes and they will not read them. They are usually on social media.

“What we have right now is a misuse of technology and it must be taken away. We have a university that has banned their undergraduate from using mobile phones,” he said.

Speaking further on the need for government to act and assist young learners to concentrate in class, the don said ban on the use of smartphones by a particular university that he did not disclose eventually assisted its students to concentrate more in class.

In his remarks, the Chairman of the MEEM Board of Trustees, Prof Buniyameen Abdulkareem, said the group being a non-governmental organisation, established by the Muslim Students’ Society of Nigeria B-Zone, organised the symposium for policymakers, students and teachers, having realised the need to tame the tide of rising cases of examination malpractices in the country.