The press conference “Facing the admission: risks and dangers of the 2011 admission campaign” took place in the “Ukrainian News” information agency on Thursday, June, 30. During the press conference the experts drew the conclusions of the EIT-2011, found out the main risks of the admission campaign and spoke about the ways of protecting the graduates’ rights.

The Head of the Management Board of the Civil network “OPORA” Ol’ha Ajvazovs’ka spoke about the public observation results during the external independent testing in 2011. The observers from OPORA noticed the high organization level of the testing and more disciplined behavior of the participants. The graduates paid more attention to the tests and didn’t distract on the accessorial. So, there were less tests cancelled because of the procedural violations of the EIT.

The question of the testing attendance and the effective usage of the state budget wasting millions of hryvnias since 2010 when the testing became optional for some categories of the graduates is still problematic.  E.g., in 2011 the budget losses were 10 million 296 thousands 080 hryvnias because of small attendance. 128 701 graduates changed their minds and didn’t come for testing. Among other critical questions OPORA named the hasteful delivery of the certificates to the graduates, and more durable checking procedure comparing with the previous year.

The most extraordinary organization problems noticed by the observers are:  

  • Ineffective delivery of the EIT certificates through the Ukrposhta. without this document the graduate has no possibility to get to the testing premises and take part in the testing. There were some cases when the certificates weren’t handed to the graduates;
  • More durable checking of the tests comparably with the previous year, when the evaluation of one “A” group paper (only close questions) lasted for 7 days. This year it lasted from 10 to 14 days:
  • Graduates’ complaints on the different complication of the Ukrainian language and literature tests during the first and the second session.

But, it can turn out that the most unusual year for testing will be 2012 when the testing terms will coincide with the studying at schools, hence it is planned to finish the EIT till the middle of June. This is the way of resolving the issue of Euro-2012 when there can’t be any public important campaigns. In addition to this, the next year will be the graduation of the pupils who have studied two foreign languages beginning with 5th grade. If they would like to pass both language exams, they would have to abandon one of them in favor of the nowadays system of grouping the foreign languages.

Speaking about the major risks of the admission campaign that officially starts from July, 1st, experts paid attention to possible violations during the students’ nomination, particularly for moving the rating list of the graduates. Last year it was one of the corruption-sensible elements of the admission campaign. Last year it was one of the most corruption-sensible elements of the campaign. Although the Admission Terms clearly established the order of nomination and declaration up to three updated lists, there remained a threat of manipulation and access to the information about the new places by the narrow set.

The new problem of 2011 will be the enlarged part of the graduates with the right to graduate to the university without passing the EIT. Last year such exemption was done for the school-leavers who left school before 2007 when they entered the departments of distant education. In 2011 all the school-leavers who left school before 2007 could omit the testing even for the entering the permanent study. As one can see, this is the way of narrowing the testing despite the wide support of the process by the public.

Inna Sovsun, the manager of the project “Legal support of the equal access to the high quality education in Ukraine” and the tutor in the National University of Kyiv-Mohyla Academy noticed that the system of electronic admission, proposed by the ministry, causes serious concerns. It wasn’t approbated in a proper way, and this creates the reasons of possible complications during the admission campaign. Despite the wide motivation of the Ministry of Education, Science, Youth and Sports, only 10% of the universities joined the “Electronic admission” by the last week.

The legal status of the electronic application wasn’t defined yet, so it is up to the admission board if they are to equate the electronic and written applications. Inna Sovsun added: “Considering the legal illiteracy of the decree about the electronic admission, for the protection of the rights of graduates and avoiding their rights’ violation, we appealed to the court to dismiss the decree as such that violates the existing legislation in the education. The first session of the court is appointed on July, 12th. The open proceeding confirms that there really exists the ground for the dismissal, so we advice the graduates to file the documents personally and don’t hope for the electronic system.”

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The press conference is supported by the International “Renaissance” fund