There may be a picture, more and more changing into acquainted in our college system, that ought to give us pause: a postgraduate candidate arrives for a thesis defence with not solely a certain dissertation, but in addition a cooler laden with meals and drinks for the examiners. It’s typically dismissed as tradition, described as non-compulsory, or waved apart as innocent custom. But for a lot of candidates, it’s neither voluntary nor benign. It’s anticipated – typically quietly, however unmistakably. And as soon as expectation enters the room, one thing important begins to erode.
A postgraduate defence is supposed to be one of the vital solemn and intellectually rigorous workouts in a college. It’s the level at which a candidate’s work is subjected to scrutiny – the place arguments are examined, strategies interrogated, and conclusions challenged. It’s, at its core, a check of advantage. In that room, just one factor ought to matter: the standard of the candidate’s scholarship. Not hospitality. Not social codes. Not unwritten obligations.
And but, throughout a number of Nigerian universities, a troubling sample is taking root. Candidates are subtly, and typically explicitly, given lists of things to offer: meals, drinks, refreshments. The observe is labelled non-compulsory, however refusal typically attracts quiet disapproval or refined stress. Departmental workers might even coordinate or supervise these preparations, embedding them inside the institutional course of. What begins as celebration regularly hardens into expectation; expectation into stress; and stress into coercion.
Graduads recount experiences
Philip (different names withheld), recalled all of the issues he had to offer whereas defending his doctoral thesis at a college within the Southwestern a part of the nation. “We made preparations for the exterior assessor to come back over and absolutely cash was paid for some issues and I used to be given the mandate to offer refreshment and drinks. Other than the supervisor, different staff within the division have been additionally taken care of,” he acknowledged.
Requested whether or not the availability of these gadgets swayed the assessors to cross him, Philip stated he was certain that he did an amazing job and that his thesis met the calls for of the assessors.
Equally, Uche, who did similar at a college within the South-East, opined that the pattern places extra {financial} stress on postgraduate college students.
“ Everyone knows what the {economic} state of affairs within the nation is now. Some individuals who go for postgraduate research accomplish that as a result of they don’t have jobs they usually imagine that bagging increased levels may enhance their chance of securing some jobs. So, asking such folks to now add the bills of obligatory feeding of individuals is killing,” he acknowledged.
Condemnation of observe on social media
A professor of Social Anthropology and African Research, Division of Sociology, Afe Babalola College, Ado Ekiti, ABUAD, Adeyemi Ademowo, stirred the hornet’s nest not too long ago with a put up on social media titled: Present your cooler earlier than protection: Ritual, coercion and the misnomer in Nigeria’s ivory towers.
He wrote: “Generally in late 2025, throughout a dialog with a colleague educating in a federal college in South-West Nigeria, a troubling phrase surfaced “protection checklist.” It sounded innocuous at first, nearly administrative. However beneath that seeming innocent bureaucratic veneer lies a deeply troubling observe that now calls for interrogation.
“Two points arose in that dialogue. The primary was the creeping commodification of information, the place analysts more and more “help” postgraduate college students by successfully producing chapters three, 4, and 5. That could be a matter for an additional day (one which requires cautious empirical investigation on my half). The second, nonetheless, is extra speedy, extra seen, and maybe extra insidious in its normalization throughout each MSc and PhD programmes. It’s what I’ve come to explain as: Present your cooler earlier than protection educational scandal.
“Throughout some Nigerian universities, postgraduate candidates, whether or not on the MSc or PhD degree, at the moment are handed a compulsory ‘protection checklist.’ This checklist doesn’t comprise scholarly necessities or mental benchmarks. Fairly, it itemises consumables: wraps of pounded yam, sorts of rice (jollof or fried), assorted meats and crates of drinks. In some cases, the protection date isn’t even fastened till this culinary obligation is glad.
Allow us to be clear: when did educational rigour turn out to be contingent on catering logistics?
“What was as soon as an off-the-cuff, voluntary gesture of appreciation has now hardened right into a coercive situation. It’s now not hospitality; it’s institutionalized expectation. And expectations, when tied to educational development, simply mutate into quiet extortion.
The moral implications are profound.
“First, it raises the query of equity and evaluative integrity. How can we convincingly separate educational judgment from social indebtedness when a candidate has clearly been tasked to offer assorted meals gadgets to host the very panel tasked with assessing them? Even when no express bias happens, the optics alone erode confidence within the credibility of the method. A system that allows such entanglement invitations suspicion, and suspicion is corrosive to institutional legitimacy.
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“Second, it deepens the already harsh realities of postgraduate training in Nigeria. In contrast to many international contexts, our MSc and PhD programmes are largely self-funded. Candidates navigate tuition, analysis prices, fieldwork logistics and in lots of instances, fundamental survival (typically with out institutional funding assist). Many are unemployed or underemployed, pursuing superior levels as pathways to unsure futures. To now impose a further, non-academic {financial} burden (below the guise of a ‘warped’ custom) isn’t solely insensitive; it’s structurally exploitative.
“Third, and maybe most troubling, is the normalisation of this observe. What begins as an exception quietly turns into a rule; what’s questioned at the moment turns into unquestionable tomorrow. That is how establishments drift, not by means of grand coverage shifts, however by means of amassed silences round small moral compromises.
“Some might argue that such practices foster collegiality, construct group, or replicate cultural values of hospitality. However tradition should not be weaponized towards ethics. Hospitality loses its ethical which means when it’s demanded. A present that’s compelled ceases to be a present.
“The college, at its core, is supposed to be an area of mental self-discipline, moral formation, and significant inquiry. It should resist the infiltration of practices that cut back scholarly rites to transactional exchanges. A protection, whether or not PGD, MSc, MPhil or PhD, isn’t a marriage reception. It isn’t a naming ceremony. It’s a rigorous mental train meant to check the originality, depth and contribution of a candidate’s analysis. Something that compromises, or seems to compromise, that sanctity should be firmly rejected.
“This isn’t a name for asceticism or the elimination of all types of celebration. Departments might, in the event that they so want, create non-compulsory, collectively funded post-defense receptions that don’t place the burden on candidates. Higher nonetheless, establishments ought to start to suppose severely about structured funding for postgraduate research, nonetheless modest. However the present trajectory the place a “protection checklist” turns into a prerequisite for tutorial analysis is untenable and must be frankly addressed instantly.
“If left unchecked, we threat producing not simply graduates, however a era socialized into the logic that success is negotiated not solely by means of advantage, however by means of materials appeasement. And that might be a much more harmful thesis than any candidate may ever defend.”
We should information towards bastardizing processes – CONUA boss
Commenting on the event, the Nationwide President of the Congress of College Lecturers, CONUA, Dr Niyi Sunmonu, opined that processes musy be guided towards bastardization.
“Allow us to be clear: tradition isn’t the issue. In African societies, we have fun achievements communally. We mark milestones, educational or in any other case, with meals, fellowship, and pleasure. There may be nothing inherently unsuitable with a candidate selecting to have fun after a profitable defence. However such celebration should stay voluntary, separate from the evaluation course of, and freed from institutional involvement. As soon as it enters the examination house, it dangers contaminating the very course of it seeks to accompany.
“Throughout main college techniques, whether or not in Japan, the UK, america, or a lot of Europe, the rules are constant. Evaluation and hospitality are strictly separated. The place refreshments are needed, they’re offered by the establishment, not the candidate. Clear moral pointers prohibit any type of inducement, nonetheless small. Exterior examiners are insulated from private obligations to candidates. And any celebration takes place after the defence, outdoors official proceedings, fully on the discretion of the candidate.These practices are usually not about austerity. They’re about safeguarding integrity.
“Some might argue that meals doesn’t affect educational judgment. Maybe it doesn’t. However that isn’t the purpose. The difficulty is notion and precedent. If candidates are anticipated to offer refreshments, what message are we sending about advantage? What stress are we inserting on those that can not afford it? What prevents escalation into extra troubling expectations? We can not, in good conscience, criticise “abdomen infrastructure” in public life whereas allowing its softer variants inside academia.
“The persistence of this observe is sustained not solely by those that put it on the market, however by those that tolerate it. We all know when one thing is unsuitable. But it’s typically rationalised as custom, dismissed as innocent,
or left unchallenged as a result of “that’s the way it has at all times been.” And nonetheless, there are exceptions – people who’ve quietly refused to conform, insisting on being judged solely on their work. In these cases, the system didn’t collapse. That alone ought to inform us that the observe isn’t needed, however entrenched.
“Reform doesn’t require sweeping laws. It requires readability and braveness. Universities should draw a agency line: no meals, drinks, or leisure inside the defence course of. Departments should not challenge lists or coordinate hospitality. Clear pointers should affirm that evaluation is predicated solely on educational advantage. College students should be empowered to grasp that their success depends upon their scholarship, not their provision. And those that want to have fun ought to accomplish that freely, however outdoors the formal educational house.
“The credibility of our universities rests not solely on what we train, however on how we look at. If we permit casual expectations to creep into formal evaluations, we threat eroding that credibility – quietly, regularly, however decisively.
“We should return to a easy precept, one that ought to by no means have been unsure: in a college, concepts should converse first. Every little thing else, irrespective of how culturally acquainted, should stay outdoors the room.”
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