Report on the results of public observation during 2011 admission campaign(August 1 - 10)

Publishing of the lists of recommended for state budget admission (1-10 August)

OPORA continues to track and analyze the quality of organization, transparency and fairness of admissions in 2011. Observers of the Network worked in 38 universities in Ukraine and responded to the messages of students and their parents about violations in other universities within 16 regions. OPORA also consulted students on legal aspects of the admission campaign, helping to resolve conflicts and misunderstandings, provided clarification on the legal grounds for action by members of admission committees through the hotline telephone and Internet.

CONCLUSION

In general, the publication of lists of recommended for the state budget admission and admission to the state budget places (during August 10/01) ran without any systemic disorders. So, unlike the situation in 2010, most admission committees of higher education institutions complied with the requirements of Admission terms and didn’t violate the procedures that provided few enrollment periods. Moreover, because of reducing of number of graduates, universities had to compete hard with each other, sometimes on the unfair basis. Universities had to meet all state requirements, and also provide adequate number of students who study for the expense of legal entities and private persons. The most important stage passed without incidents, however, the 2011 applicants faced more advantageous situation than last year.

Therefore, the major problems of the above-mentioned stage was unfair competition for the graduates between higher education institutions, which was conducted in breach of the admission terms, ungrounded extra points for participants of nationwide Olympiads, indicating about lack of work on a thorough examination of data from separate admission boards; inadequate informing of students about the cancellation of admission for separate specializations.

RECOMMENDATIONS

• To ensure adequate oversight by line ministries for the checking of data for entrants who have right for additional points: the winners of competitions and the Minor Academy of Sciences of the state level and international level participants. Carry out random parallel monitoring, providing disciplinary punishment of university employees who, under the pretext of "technical errors" and "human factor" tend to justify actions that have signs of neglecting or abuse.
• To extend the terms of document filing for the entrants during the announcement of the second and third list of recommended for admission to 3 days, clearly indicate the time of data publication in the Terms of university admission for 2012. This will ensure adequate and equal amount of time for each applicant's right to equal membership in admission to various educational institutions of Ukraine and prevented self-willed treatment of the admission periods;
• To review the facts of unfair competition between universities for students who plan to study either at the expense of state budget or private persons or legal entities, if the competition has led to violations of Admission terms.
• Organize a broad public discussion of unified criteria for allocation of state budget places, including the popularity of the university among students and the ability to enforce the objectives of its quota, organization of full-scaled competitive situation. Thus, the problem of admission cancellation during the admission process in some areas will be prevented. OPORA also urges to practice the disclosure of the order about the distribution of state demand with all applications on the official website of the line ministries.

Competition picture in 2011

Nearly 290,000 students competed for the right to receive a bachelor's degree in higher education institutions III-IV level of accreditation. \IS "Competition" registered 194,566 certificates of external testing, among which 163,553 were received in 2011, 19 741 - in 2010, 5703 – in 2009 and 5267 – in 2008. Statistics shows that a small number of applicants used the evaluation results of past years. However, the practice of equation of rating points for EIT for different years, which is unnatural for this system of assessment, still needs to be abolished in the future admission campaigns.

Competitive situation makes it possible to analyze to which universities have applied the most successful graduates. This list slightly differs from the rating of the most popular universities among the graduates. The first place in popularity among those who scored 200 points  is  for KNU (644 applications), second - NU "Kyiv-Mohyla Academy" (512 applications), the third - National Technical University of  Ukraine "Kyiv Polytechnic Institute" (381 applications) , fourth - Ivan Franko Lviv National University (357 applications), the fifth – Kyiv National V,Hetman Economical University (252 applications).However, there is one more rating of universities that are in demand among the participants of the admission , which for various reasons are not tested and may be assessed during the traditional exam. In the first place with 498 applications  is Berdyansk University of Management and Business, 2^nd - National Technical University "Kharkiv Polytechnic Institute" (422 applications), 3^rd - National Dragomanov Pedagogical University (345 applications), 4^th - Kryvyy Rih Technical University (325 applications), 5^th - Uman State Pedagogical University (263 applications). This difference suggests a different orientation of students at universities that enroll students into its ranks for the parallel evaluation systems.

Top 10 universities with the majority of graduates during 2011 compared with last year is as follows:

Unfair competition between universities

The admission process in 2011 faced the unfair struggle for the graduates, in order to meet the numbers of state budget places and enroll the required number of contract students. The numbers of  students in both categories in the university is the key factor in determining which funding from the state and both legal entities and private persons will be met by the university. The situation with state demand remains opaque, in fact, there are no clear criteria for its distribution among universities. We remind that the number of graduates in 2011 was reduced by 42% and state demand within the country - by 20%. Therefore, some admission boards had to try exotic methods of struggle for entrant. For example, in Rivne State Humanitarian University the board has recommended all entrants who were willing to study according to the contract before August 10. For example, there were 400 names in "management" list, although the licensed number is half this amount - 90 seats. The OPORA observer got the explanation for such action by the chairman of the selection committee number 3 Mykola Antoniuk, who announced the decision of the selection committee to contract all who paid for study so as not to lose students.

In the budget places in the Sumy National Agriculture University entrants were "fixed" otherwise. The Executive Secretary of the admission board Oleksandr Kovbasa informed the observer  that the administration of the institution planned to vise the decree of nomination on 8 August, without waiting for deadline on August, 10, . Therefore, applicants who wished to take the original of the documents during the "third wave" - publication of lists of the recommended (August 8-10 ) in other universities, were denied. Such haste is connected with the complexity of the dismissal procedure , if the high school signed appropriate decree, the applicants would have failed to take the documents in two days of the "third wave"  to enter other universities on August 10. So, parents had to appeal to the Regional Board of Education, who helped to return the originals to their owners.

But in the admission board of the Kyiv Polytechnic Institute, the number of students who were reported that they are recommended for admission, is more than the number of allocated budget places. Therefore, applicants were asked to bring original documents as soon as possible. In the KPI the authorities expected more budget places for "reserve students," although the latter did not know about the uncertainty of the situation with their graduation to the budget places. The university administration after the intervention of OPORA observers pledged not to engage in such practices but still guaranteed to provide the appropriate graduates with budget places.

Ungrounded charges of extra points

Innovations for additional points for applicants who won competitions  of nationwide level in 2011, sometimes was used with violations repeatedly recorded by OPORA observers. However, if during the stage of receiving documents such inaccuracies could be justified by human factor or "technical" errors, then during the publication of lists of recommended for nomination, such incidents can be regarded as abuse. After all, it is quite simple to check additional points. The names and details of all winners are recorded in the respective decree of  line ministry.

The admission board of Mykolayiv State Universityof V. Suhomlynskyy gave 40 points to the female graduate, which entered the faculty of psychology. Legally they could be reached, for example, if the above mentioned person won 2^nd place as a result of competition in nationwide level. Thus, the graduate with 631.9 points claimed for education at the expense of private persons. After the intervention of an observer on August 10, the admission board took away the accrued points, depriving the applicant the opportunity to study under the contract. The university administration called for "technical errors" and promised an additional check of the lists of recommended persons.

Inappropriate informing of graduates about the abolition of admission to certain specialization