…Issues New NCE/ND Guidelines
The Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board(JAMB) has stated that no admission into any affiliated programme in any College of Education will be allowed from the 2026/2027 academic session.
In an advisory signed by its registrar, Prof. Is-haq Oloyede in June 2026, JAMB directed that no new entrant will be admitted into 100 or 200 Level of any College of Education, with all candidates required to enter only through the Nigeria Certificate in Education mode.
Under the new guidelines, every application for NCE is a deliberate choice and candidates cannot run UTME or Direct Entry processes alongside it. JAMB said candidates seeking to migrate from NCE to UTME must disclose any pending NCE application, as each applicant will be processed for only one mode of entry at a time.
The Board also introduced a mandatory O’level verification step through WAEC, NECO, NABTEB or NBAIS before registration.
Candidates are to pay N1,500 for verification of one sitting and N2,000 for two sittings, after which they will complete registration for N4,200 at a JAMB accredited CBT centre or the College’s Institutional Professional Registration Centre, which every College must run with a minimum of two registration points.
For 2026 admissions, JAMB said details of all candidates who have already applied through the 2026 UTME mode shall be automatically migrated to their chosen 1st Choice College of Education or Agric Related Non-Technology ND Programmes.
Those candidates must obtain the O’level verification code, approach any College of Education, IPRC or CBT Centre to update their profile and verification code, and pay only N700 as registration fee.
The Board noted that the N3,500 JAMB application fee will not be paid by this category, as the College will propose and recommend them on the eFacility portal.
New NCE candidates are still allowed to register for the 2026/2027 session by following the verification and registration process.
The policy also immediately affects 2026 Direct Entry and 100 Level UTME candidates who had selected affiliated Colleges of Education for degree programmes.
JAMB said such candidates have options at no cost: DE candidates can apply for a change of institution before June 22, request transfer to the parent university, or allow their second choice institution to become their first choice, while 100 Level UTME candidates can also switch to the NCE programme of the College they initially picked.
The Board added that candidates already irregularly admitted in 2024 and 2025 can be condoned after obtaining the O’level verification code and completing registration, but this does not apply to 2026 intakes.
“Candidates with Awaiting Results status cannot be proposed or recommended until they upload their results,” it noted.
