On August, 2nd in the press centre of the IA "UNIAN" it was the press conference called "The Preliminary Conclusions of the 2011 admission campaign - one step to the finish". The participants drew attention on the key problems during the finishing and overview of the EIT and the violations during the university admission.
Three key faults in organization of 2011 testing as one of the most important stages in the admission campaign are:
- Ungrounded changes in the program contents in December 2010 that led to shortening of the preparation time for the graduates;
- The problems with delivery of the testing certificates to the participants – without the certificate the graduates couldn’t take part in the testing and, as a result, in the admission campaign;
- Slow checking procedure in fact deprived the graduates of the right to appeal the results in the Appealing Committee of the UCEQE. The first grades were announced on June, 25th, the last ones – on July, 5th, during the admission of the documents to the universities. Considering the fact that the appeal consideration can last up to 10 days, not all the graduates risked to use the possibility. Instead of 7 days (as it was the previous year), the A paper with close questions was checked up to 16 days.
As a result of the 3206 appeals, 79% of grades weren't changed, 12% were upgraded, 2% were lowered.
BASIC FAULTS OF THE 2011 ADMISSION CAMPAIGN
The lack of transparency in the work of admission boards that violated the procedure of publishing the decisions in 2 days after the adoption, as it is stated in the Admission terms. So, the graduates were deprived of the right to get to the important data. E.g., the National Dragomanov Pedagogical University on August, 1st didn’t publish the internal examination results. Besides, the university didn’t supply this data to the 1C “Contest".
The National Aviation University traditionally releases the lists of recommended for the nomination without the data about the participants of the graduation campaign, so to say, in the alphabetical order without the contest score and categorizing of the graduates (the privileged, the purposeful, out of competition), the extra points for the pre-university preparation, victories in the academic contests or the Minor Academy of Sciences). It is the violation of the Admission terms in part of the lists filling out.
Manipulation with state budget places led to the situation when not all the graduates on the date of releasing the first lists of recommended for nomination, i.e. on August,1st, learned about the quantity of state budget places for each specialization and the chances to be nominated. Besides, the Ministry announced to OPORA in the answer on July, 29, that there is still the coordination of the state demand for each specialization and the current contest situation. So, it was assumed that the process is coordinated manually. For already 2 years the Decree about the state demand with all attachments is the secret document without the access of public and the graduates.
The inconsistency of the Admission rules approved by the Ministry with the Admission terms influences the order of the admission campaign in different Ukrainian universities and violates the consistent procedure. Such situation leads to the violation of the principle of equal access to the education for all the citizens. The uncovered facts make evident the inattentive reading of the admission rules project that is provided by the university administration to the Ministry. Lead by the prohibition to implement changes to the Rules during the admission, some universities use the self-estimated provisions. For instance, Kharkiv National University of Economy defined the economy theory as the profile subject for one of the specializations, although there were no EIT for this subject. So, the university offered to pass extra exam, despite the fact that such option is not included in the admission terms and is not used in other universities.
Using of extra points for the preparatory courses sometimes resembled the covert corruption. Up to 20 points can be added for those who passed the courses for engineering, technical, physical and natural sciences. If the graduate passes 150-hours preparation course, licensed by the Ministry, he will get up to 20 bonus points to the total score. But this new feature was strangely adopted by the universities. The National University "Kyiv Polytechnic Institute", Zaporizhzhya National Technical University, National University "Kharkiv Polytechnic Institute", Donetsk National University, The National Metallurgic Academy of Ukraine added 20 pts to all who passed the courses. So, instead of evaluation the graduates were gifted maximum scores – regardless to the fact if the graduates deserved them. The innovation was turned into covert bribery,- all the courses are paid and the participants are eager to get the points instead of knowledge. Some universities decided to add extra points for the preparation courses to the economical faculties, - changing the limited list on their own will, that violates the Admission terms. E.g., in Odesa National Sea University 4 graduates got the extra points for the specialization "Management" on the faculty of economics and administration.
Electronic admission was unsuccessful experiment. This year the graduates had the possibility to file the documents to the admission boards not only in the direct way but also via the Internet. In a week before start of the campaign only 10% of the universities joined the system. The delay of the connection led to the breakdowns because by July, 1, the date when the admission of the documents started, not all the universities got their logins and passwords to the system, a lot of universities had no idea how to work in it. During the first days of admission there were problems with connection to the database, although there wasn‘t many graduates then. Besides, the graduates expressed complaints because the system sometimes lowered the scores up to the decimal points – the score 186,5 could be registered as 186, the applications were sent to different universities or the system gave up and refused to register the data despite the correctness of their input. But the most trouble was connected with the fact that the data were used by private structures that can use it not only for admission. The Admission terms (p. 6.1) say that the graduate personally files the application to the university. The acknowledgement of the graduate with the admission rules, license and the accreditation certificate of certain specialization and approving of release of the testing results is fixed and approved by the personal signature. It is impossible without the visit of the graduate to the admission board hence there is no tradition of electronic signature in Ukraine.
The observers of OPORA proceed to work in 16 regions of Ukraine and maintain the complex monitoring of the admission campaign. We are waiting for the crucial stage - the assignment to the universities causing a lot of problems in the past. OPORA will announce about all the violations and hopes for successful end of the admission for the bright graduates.
The aim of the project "Public monitoring of the 2011 admission campaign" that is maintained by CN "OPORA" together with the Educational Program of the International "Renaissance" fund and the Program of favouring the EIT in Ukraine (USETI Alliance) is the objective evaluation of the 2011 admission campaign and helping to protect the rights of graduates. The aim of the Educational Program is to favor the systematic changes in the Ukrainian education aimed at the best European examples, to enhance the quality of education and turn it into the means of forming the welfare state.