The Federal Government of Nigeria has introduced a new regulation requiring all prospective National Youth Service Corps participants to submit their academic theses or project reports to the Nigeria Education Repository and Databank as a prerequisite for mobilization.
This directive, effective from October 6, 2025, aims to digitize and preserve academic outputs from Nigerian graduates. Graduates from universities, polytechnics, colleges of education, and overseas institutions must deposit their theses, dissertations, or final year projects into the NERD platform.
According to the NERD spokesperson, Haula Galadima, “The NERD Policy applies in equal measures to all education delivery institutions… apart from the mandate to verify for authenticity as a national flagship, the NERD digitisation programme has a clear objective – to raise the bar in the quality of academic content, output and presentation nationwide.”
The initiative seeks to raise academic standards by encouraging better supervision from lecturers, whose names will appear alongside student works on a globally accessible platform. President Bola Ahmed Tinubu has approved an academic output monetization and reward mechanism for students and their lecturers, allowing them to earn lifetime revenues from their academic deposits.
This move is expected to safeguard the nation’s intellectual assets while restoring credibility to academic processes and qualifications. Serving Corps members or those enrolled before the October 6th enforcement date are not affected by this directive.
The directive applies to all education delivery institutions, regardless of ownership type, including public, private, military, or civilian institutions. Graduates must upload their existing thesis/project to NERD as proof of academic output.
The Federal Government’s decision has been made to ensure that Nigerian graduates meet the required academic standards and to promote the country’s intellectual assets.