The university community is, undoubtedly, a haven for growth, maturity, self-dependency, and self-sufficiency. Every new student who gets admitted into the university grapples with a myriad of fears in the pursuit of his/her dreams. The initial dream of every freshman is to graduate with a strong CGPA. The word “initial” is intentionally used because some students lose track along the way while many others eventually relinquish this dream as the chances of its feasibility become very low. Likewise, the complacent ones have no reasons to push harder, after all, school na scam.

In the pursuit of a bachelor’s degree, students, even singles, bachelors, spinsters and married, tend to be drowned in the fear of becoming. They aim to make their parents or guardians very proud of their achievements. They don’t want their years of waiting at home to be unproductive. They want their future self to boast about their present tribulations. At the peak of it all, everyone wants to be the Best Graduating Student of a single class. As a result, they set out on a journey of salvation, prepared to build a relationship with a senior colleague, a ‘Saviour’—the one who aces their courses and can hand over the same mantle. Either the relationship is genuine or fake, it doesn’t really count.

In rare cases, these junior colleagues consider the fact that their ‘Saviour’ has blood running through their veins. They bombard their DMs with messages, expecting instant responses. In other cases, they expect their senior colleagues to help them with assignments and other questions which should instead get them buried in their books and online resources. Some of them even feel a sense of entitlement to everything they demand. It all becomes a right although it should be a mere privilege. To them, they are only making their ‘Saviour’ live a fulfilled life, a life of sacrifices.

The Fount deifies the University of Ibadan by appealing to “help enshrine the right to learn”. Further, the anthem portrays her as a citadel of learning where “greatness (is) won with honest toil.” And lastly, “self-reliance” and “unity” are cherished goals of the university. This reminds me of two incidents: (i) our bickering moment in the class WhatsApp group due to a colleague’s refusal to send his extra course materials, and (ii) three 100 level students making derogatory remarks about their faculty president because, according to them, the intelligent folk refused to be their tutor.

According to the Oxford Dictionary, “self-reliance” means the ability to do or decide things by yourself, rather than depending on other people for help. While mentorship is very pivotal to students’ all-around survival on campus, it should be stressed that self-reliance constrains the maternal fury of a goat to strike a horn on her greedy kid. It is a truism that very few senior colleagues wholeheartedly embrace mentorship, ensuring that their junior colleagues study very hard and smartly and consequently ace their courses, but this is not an avenue to rid them of their deserved freedom and breathing space. Sadly, some of these senior colleagues can not even complain because they don’t know the “how”.

The world is evolving rapidly, with technology advancing every single day. This is evident in UI students’ free access to the Internet. But instead of the students maximizing this opportunity to source for research items, articles, and journals on their subjects of discourse, merely walking past them, you would hear their phones emitting sounds from social media reels and WhatsApp statuses. It even becomes an easy peasy if the ‘Saviour’ never refuses to attend to them. Even when that ‘Saviour’ sends any information, they see no need to establish the authenticity. Of course, it would be a mere disrespect to do so when a whole scholar has helped them out.

What is the way forward? Each department/faculty within the university community is encouraged to have an academic/tutorial committee. As such, the tutors know when they are supposed to fix classes for their junior colleagues and the latter also know when they are supposed to ask for tutorial sessions. These tutorial sessions should not be another lecture-giving moment but a review of what they already know and an elucidation of what they are supposed to know ahead of time. Concepts are to be broken down into bits. Chit-chats and unnecessary discussions should be prevented. Instead, tutors should accommodate questions and must be prepared to answer them appropriately. This implies that the membership of this committee should not be hinged on the envisioned certification but on a track record of academic excellence and proficiency. They should also compile past questions which serve as a guide for the junior colleagues.

Some other players of this game hoard course materials so that they would get higher marks than their counterparts. Rivalry springs up when the atmosphere becomes competitive. This often leads to factions within the class. Without a modicum of doubt, no group can forge ahead if it’s bereft of unity. And also, it is impossible for all students to have access to the same materials. Hence, students should not bear it in mind that they have any right to their colleagues’ resources. And if they will find them helpful, they should cultivate the habit of making such requests instead of initiating hate because they assume that their colleagues are hoarding materials. After all, it might just be an assumption.