The study aimed to determine if any of the entry requirements such as Ordinary Level (OL) results, Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME) scores or Post-UTME (PUTME) scores could predict an outstanding academic performance of first-year undergraduate students admitted into the Faculty of Science in the Kaduna State University, Kaduna. The study adopted the descriptive research design. A purposive sample of nine hundred and forty-three (943) first-year students constituted the population for the study were drawn from Computer Science, Mathematics and Physics undergraduate degree programmes from the Faculty of Science of the university who were admitted from the 2010/2011 to 2014/2015 academic sessions. The instruments for data collection were OL, UTME and first-year Cumulative Grade Point Average (CGPA) results, which were coded and analysed with the aid of Computational Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS). Pearson Product Moment Correlation (PPMC) Coefficient and Multinomial Logistics Regression (MLR) were the statistics used to answer the four research questions used. The results revealed that with a weak correlation, OL is a good predictor on the CGPA, a dependent variable, for academic performance which holds true for students who are in the CGPA category of '1st class' and '2nd Class Lower' respectively. It concluded that the use of OL and UTME as instruments is not enough to select candidates for admission and therefore recommended that other instruments such as senior secondary school mock examinations need to be included as part of the entry requirements in the admission criteria.

In recent times, the phenomenal increase in the population of people and livestock in the world has placed an enormous pressure on water and land resources used by both crop farmers and herders alike. Desertification, deforestation and uncertainties in climatic conditions in Sub-Saharan Africa have led to massive movements of herders in search of pasture with resultant conflicts with local farm communities in the region. The inability to find a lasting solution to these problems has led to persistent cases of deteriorating relationships amongst crop farmers and herders which has continued to precipitate hostile consequences including the loss of lives, interruption and annihilation of the family units and in some cases, whole communities are destroyed. This research attempts to address the problem of inadequate grazing resources by the use of advances in Computational Intelligence Techniques in the determination of the optimum maturity of maize, so as to complement for the grazing of livestock in the region. Although the challenge inherent in determining the optimum maturity of maize is by no means trivial, the practice was hitherto based on human perception, which is a function of experience over time. This paper leverages on the use of Artificial Neural Networks (ANN) interfaced with image processing and Convolutional Neural Networks (pre-trained ResNet50 Network) in determining the optimum ripeness of the maize crop grown in Sub-Saharan Africa. Results obtained indicated a 3.5% improvement classification accuracy of pre-trained ResNet50 over ANN model, providing a stimulus for further research on the subject area. Therefore, this research posits that farmers could be sensitized on the possibility of utilizing image processing and neural networks technique in the determination of the maturity of maize in the nearest future when made operational.

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The study aimed to assess whether the students from mathematical science-based undergraduate degree programmes in Kaduna State University perform academically better when either the Computer-Based Test (CBT) or the Paper-Pencil Test (PPT) is used to write the Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME), which is conducted annually by the Joint Admissions Matriculation Board (JAMB). The study adopted a quantitative approach to research. A purposive sample of one thousand and twenty-three (1023) first-year students constituted the population for the study. This population

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