By Omotoso GodsDelight
The beginning of every academic semester at Obafemi Awolowo University (OAU) is often marked by a flurry of activities and challenges for students. While some grapple with adjusting to the academic calendar after a long holiday, others are preoccupied with resuming reading or finding means to settle their school fees. However, one issue unites students across departments when the course registration portal opens: the scramble to register for special electives.
Special electives at OAU are compulsory courses taken outside a student's primary department or faculty. Designed to provide a broader, well-rounded education, every student must complete at least six units of these electives before graduation. Most electives carry two units, meaning students typically register for three or more over their academic stay. Faculties across the university offer various electives under codes such as SEA (Governance and Administration), SEG (Food Production and the Nation), SEE (Indigenous Education in Nigeria), SEP (Drugs and Society), and SET (Technology and Society), among others.
However, what was designed to enhance learning has become a chaotic process that students often approach with anxiety and resignation. During registration, students refresh the school portal repeatedly, desperately trying to secure a slot in any available elective—often without concern for content or interest. For many, it’s not about what they learn but simply about registering the required number of electives before their final year to meet graduation requirements.
To better understand students' experiences, OAUPeeps interviewed several students across departments and levels.
Deborah, a final-year student of Building, explained that her main challenge with electives was late registration due to a lack of awareness. “Registering special electives for me wasn't so much of a hassle; I just could not register early because I wasn't so informed about it, and I didn't have space on my portal to register for it,” she said.
She acknowledges that though special electives allow her to learn beyond her discipline, she does not treat them as seriously as her core courses. When asked if electives broadened her knowledge or felt like ticking academic boxes, she replied: “I will go for the two options. We learn, but sometimes we want to tick the boxes.”
Her favourites were SEG 001 and SEG 002, which she described as stress-free and involving field trips.
Peace Taiwo, a 200-level student of German in the Department of Foreign Languages, had a smoother registration experience but viewed electives as more of a burden than a learning opportunity. She said, “It was more of an extra burden for me than an opportunity to learn.”
Peace also raised concerns about unreturned results: “I had an issue with SEO 001; I had not seen the result to date.” Her preferred elective was SEG, which she described as “easy peasy.”
Verita, a 300-level Law student, recounted a particularly frustrating experience in her first year because the school made SEO 003 compulsory for freshmen. “I already picked two electives, but because I wanted to pick SEO 003, I had to remove the two electives I picked and go for SEO 003, only for me to see that the number of students that had registered was enough. I had to return to pick the two electives I first picked. The same thing happened, so I could only end up with one elective, which was not my choice,” she said.
She described the overall experience as burdensome and offered specific suggestions for improvement. Speaking about students' stress when writing elective exams, she said, “The school should provide computers for faculties so that faculty members will go to their faculty to write the exam rather than waiting for hours under the scorching sun to write a forty-minute exam.”
Suzan, another 300-level law student, shared similar frustrations, especially since only a few students could register for an elective. Like Verita, she also lamented the weekly quizzing of some electives. “The elective which stressed me the most was SEO 003 because they do quizzes every week, and if you miss one, it is a problem. Even the result didn't come out well because everyone offering it in my faculty got almost the same score,” she noted.
Her recommendation: “The school should provide more CBT centres for exam purposes because of the large population of students.”
Oyetola, a 200-level student of Industrial Chemistry, described the electives system as a game of speed. “Special electives are 'first come, first served'. You have to be fast so you don't end up with hard electives,” she said.
She admitted that she hardly attends elective classes unless they are on Google Classroom. “There was this special elective that was holding an event on a Saturday, and we were not informed before, and they said they would mark attendance for it because there was going to be an invited guest,” she said.
On reforming the exam structure, she suggested that elective exams should be done online, like the Post-UTME format.
Meanwhile, OAUPeeps also interviewed lecturers handling these electives to share their insights. A lecturer from the Department of Building, who preferred not to be named, highlighted how, overseas, he had the opportunity to take courses unrelated to his discipline, which enriched his academic exposure.
“The idea is to give students basic knowledge about other courses and how they run,” he said.
However, he acknowledged that achieving this goal at OAU is difficult: “Some students are unserious; they just want to receive their certificates... Some support themselves; they don’t have much time for their studies, not to talk of special electives.”
On whether he has faced any issues regarding special electives, he explained that he doesn't face any special difficulty since electives are just like any other class, where some students will listen and some will not.
However, he complained about the availability of buses for field trips, which usually come from the school. “I was even writing to the school for a refund because we paid for three buses during the SEM 001 field trip, but the school only gave us one,” he explained.
Speaking with another lecturer from the department, he emphasised that these electives were intended to make the students vast in all disciplines. “Electives are supposed to be easy and interesting, but most students are not just aware of the usefulness,” he said.
However, he remained uncertain whether the school was achieving this objective with the students. This uncertainty arises because students have different attitudes to classes depending on their backgrounds. He explained that some students already have a job waiting for them if they graduate, whether well or poorly, so such students won't take their classes very seriously.
For improvement, he suggested making the courses more engaging and accessible. “Elective courses should be diluted for students, make them interesting so that their attention can be secured,” he said.
Once designed to broaden academic horizons, special electives on the OAU campus have gradually lost their shine. They’ve become a routine struggle, less about learning and more about survival. What should be a chance to explore new knowledge is now a frantic race for easy grades and available slots. The pressure, the shortcuts, and the yearly portal panic have become the norm for OAU students. And yet, beneath the surface, the original purpose of these courses still lingers, waiting to be revived. The question remains: Will these electives continue to burden students, or will reforms revive their intended value and meaning? Only time—and deliberate action—will tell.
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