It covers curriculum and structure, examination bodies, regulators and agencies, tertiary frameworks, data protection, and platform vocabulary.
Curriculum and structure
NERDC
Nigerian Educational Research and Development Council — develops and reviews the national curriculum. See NERDC curriculum.
Basic education
Compulsory education comprising primary and junior secondary under the Universal Basic Education framework. Nigeria has been consulting on extending compulsory basic education to twelve years; confirm the current position with the Federal Ministry of Education.
6-3-3-4
The structure the Nigerian system has conventionally described itself by: six years primary, three junior secondary, three senior secondary, four tertiary.
JSS and SSS
Junior Secondary School (JSS1–JSS3) and Senior Secondary School (SS1–SS3).
Performance objective
The level within the NERDC curriculum at which a specific expectation is stated. The meaningful level for coverage tracking; anything coarser tells a school very little.
Scheme of work
The distribution of curriculum content across the weeks of a term.
Continuous assessment (CA)
Assessment accumulated across a term or session contributing to a pupil’s overall result, weighted against terminal examination by the school’s or state’s policy.
Arm
A parallel class group within the same year, for example JSS2 Gold and JSS2 Silver.
Examination bodies and examinations
WAEC
West African Examinations Council, which conducts WASSCE. See WAEC / WASSCE.
WASSCE
West African Senior School Certificate Examination, taken at the end of senior secondary, graded A1 to F9 with C6 and above counted as a credit.
NECO
National Examinations Council, which conducts the SSCE, the BECE for federal unity colleges and the National Common Entrance Examination. See NECO.
BECE
Basic Education Certificate Examination, taken at the end of JSS3, commonly called Junior WAEC. See BECE.
JAMB
Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board, which conducts the UTME.
UTME
Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination, the computer-based matriculation examination for Nigerian tertiary admission. See JAMB UTME.
Direct Entry
Admission route into a Nigerian tertiary institution for candidates holding advanced-level qualifications, a National Diploma or NCE, bypassing the UTME.
Post-UTME
Institutional screening conducted after the UTME as part of admission.
NCEE
National Common Entrance Examination, for admission into federal unity colleges.
IGCSE
International General Certificate of Secondary Education, offered by Cambridge and widely delivered in Nigerian private and international schools. See Cambridge IGCSE.
Credit
A grade of C6 or better in WASSCE or NECO SSCE. Five credits including English and Mathematics is the conventional threshold for tertiary admission.
Agencies and regulators
UBEC
Universal Basic Education Commission — federal body overseeing basic education implementation and intervention funding.
SUBEB
State Universal Basic Education Board — the state-level counterpart of UBEC.
NEMIS
Nigeria Education Management Information System — the national education data system fed by school returns and the annual census. See NEMIS and EMIS reporting.
EMIS
Education Management Information System — the general term; states operate their own alongside NEMIS.
TRCN
Teachers Registration Council of Nigeria — registers and licenses teachers, with continuing professional development required for renewal. See teacher development.
NTI
National Teachers’ Institute — provides teacher education and professional development programmes.
NUC
National Universities Commission — regulates Nigerian universities and sets academic standards.
CCMAS
Core Curriculum and Minimum Academic Standards — the NUC framework defining programme learning outcomes and minimum standards, with a share of content at institutional discretion. See higher education.
NBTE
National Board for Technical Education — regulates polytechnics and technical institutions.
NCCE
National Commission for Colleges of Education — regulates colleges of education.
TETFund
Tertiary Education Trust Fund — funds infrastructure and development in public tertiary institutions.
Data protection
NDPA 2023
Nigeria Data Protection Act 2023 — principal data protection legislation, establishing the Nigeria Data Protection Commission. See NDPA and data protection.
NDPR
Nigeria Data Protection Regulation 2019 — the earlier framework preceding the Act.
Data controller
The party deciding what personal data is collected and why. For pupil data this is the school, and the responsibility does not transfer to a software vendor.
Data processor
A party processing personal data on the controller’s documented instructions. This is a school software vendor’s role.
Platform vocabulary
School management system (SMS)
Software holding the operational school record: admissions, pupils, timetable, attendance, results, fees. See school management.
Learning management system (LMS)
Software for delivering and tracking instructional content. An LMS is about teaching; an SMS is about records. Many schools run both and reconcile them by hand.
CBT
Computer-based testing — assessment delivered and marked on screen. See CBT and assessment.
Pedagogy with AI
Using AI to plan, adapt and evidence teaching while the teacher retains judgment and accountability, anchored to a stated model and a named curriculum objective. See Pedagogy with AI.
Multi-tenant
An architecture in which many schools run on one platform with their data separated. What allows a state to deploy across hundreds of schools without hundreds of installations.
Offline tolerance
The ability to continue working through connectivity loss and sync afterwards. In Nigerian conditions this is a requirement rather than a feature.