Some Vitebsk universities are experiencing a shortage of students
In many higher education institutions of the country, the acceptance of documents for state-funded education was completed on July 12. At the same time, due to a significant shortage of students in certain universities, on July 19, the Ministry of Education announced the start of a “preferential” additional enrollment. Meanwhile, the admission campaign is proceeding as usual: internal examinations have been held in educational institutions for a number of subjects, and it is possible to enroll in paid education until July 31. Admissions committees of Vitebsk universities note that they have managed to fill most of the state-funded places.
Unmanageable Centralized Testing
This year again did not bring high results in the Centralized Testing (CT), especially in exact sciences and languages. According to the Republican Institute for Knowledge Control, almost 36%, or more than 40 thousand applicants, failed the tests, meaning they did not score the minimum passing scores in at least one subject. The largest number among them are those who failed physics, mathematics, and foreign language. Surprisingly, there are also over 2 thousand unsuccessful applicants who could not score the required minimum in all three subjects. As a reminder, the minimum for Russian and Belarusian languages was set at 10 points, for mathematics, physics, chemistry, and biology – at 15, for the history of Belarus, world history, geography, social studies, and foreign languages – at 20 points.
It is worth noting that the Minister of Education, Sergey Maskevich, emphasized in one of the television interviews that the reasons for the situation are not in the complexity of the CT (the tests, in his opinion, have been analyzed and correspond to the level of previous years), but in the weak preparation of yesterday's schoolchildren in a number of exact sciences.
However, not everything is so bad. 247 applicants received 100 points, with 18 of them in two subjects at once. And two girls even managed to pass all three tests with maximum scores.
In the Vitebsk Regional Testing Center, statistics are kept not on individual participants, but on so-called person-tests, i.e., applications for taking a specific subject. In the region, 31,334 person-tests were registered, and 29,797 certificates were issued (with over 12,000 applicants participating in the testing). Interestingly, 6,012, or about 20% of the certificates, were unsuccessful and could not be submitted to universities. 19 applicants managed to score 0 points on the CT in one of the subjects and were left without the necessary documents for admission.
As in the country as a whole, in the Vitebsk region, physics (almost 42% of applicants scored less than 15 points), mathematics (40%), German, and English languages (about 20%) were the worst passed.
According to Galina Dryukova, a methodologist at the center, this year's CT results for all subjects are lower than in 2013.
Some places are crowded, others are empty
So, out of 117,000 registered nationwide for the CT, only 72,766 people can now submit documents to university admission committees. Is this a lot or a little? If we assume that all these applicants want to study at universities for free and full-time, then the competition this year in a number of universities is quite high. After all, back in the spring, Minister of Education Sergey Maskevich announced the enrollment figures: 30.5 thousand state-funded places, of which 23.6 thousand are for full-time study, and 6.9 thousand for part-time study. It turns out that more than three people competed for each full-time state-funded place. But this is theory. As always, the strongest applicants chose prestigious specialties and metropolitan universities, creating huge competition there, while a number of technical and agricultural educational institutions had a shortfall in enrollment.
The situation in Vitebsk universities is mixed. Traditionally, all state-funded places at the medical university are filled without problems. The secretary of the university's admissions committee, Alexander Pashkov, reported that 425 places are filled in the medical faculty (passing score 271 and competition of 2.1 people per place), and 130 in the pharmaceutical faculty (323 points and 2 people per place). This year, it is also planned to enroll about a hundred foreign students, and even among them there is competition. There are no problems with enrollment for fee-paying places, despite the high tuition fees, for which documents are accepted until July 31. But already now, for all 175 paid places in the medical faculty, there are applicants, and for the 60 places in the pharmaceutical faculty, more than 100 people are applying.
The situation is also good at Vitebsk State University named after P. Masherov, where state-funded places are filled in almost all specialties, with the exception of “Physics. Scientific and Production Activities”. A total of 460 people were admitted to full-time state-funded education and 240 to part-time. The most prestigious specialties are “Romance-Germanic Philology (English Language)” (passing score 281) and “Law” (270). According to the deputy secretary of the admissions committee, Natalia Semechkina, it was possible to fill all state-funded places thanks to the university's serious career guidance work and changes in the rules for admission to higher education institutions. It is now easier for strong graduates to enroll in pedagogical specialties.
The situation is worse at the Academy of Veterinary Medicine, where, according to the latest data, 18% of state-funded places are unfilled. According to the university's admissions committee secretary, Yevgeny Yushkovsky, there are 50 unfilled places in the "Veterinary Medicine" specialty and 35 in "Zootechnics" with full-time study. At the same time, the "Veterinary and Sanitary Expertise" specialty is traditionally in high demand (2 people per place) and "Veterinary Pharmacy" (more than 2 people per place). There is also competition for specialties with shortened study periods. The university accepts documents for paid study until July 31, and correspondence students are expected from November 1 to 30.
There is a significant shortage of students at the Vitebsk State Technological University, especially in engineering specialties. The responsible secretary of the admissions committee, Vitaly Petukhov, reported that 80 out of 310 places remain vacant in the full-time department, and 50 out of 150 in the correspondence department. Although the specialties "Communicative Design," "Finance and Credit," and "Information Systems and Technologies in Design and Production" are traditionally popular.
Both VSTU and VSAVM have high hopes for the Ministry of Education's decision on additional enrollment of applicants.
According to the press service of the Ministry of Education, additional enrollment in universities for in-demand specialties, where there are still vacant state-funded places after the main enrollment, will be held: for military specialties – from July 21 to 25, for cultural spheres – July 27-28, for all others – from July 23 to 28.
Additional enrollment is carried out only for full-time state-funded education for the following specialties: “Primary education”, “Mathematics and Informatics”, “Physics and Informatics”, “Vocational training”, “Mathematics (scientific and pedagogical activity)”, “Physics (scientific and pedagogical activity)”, “Applied Mathematics (scientific and pedagogical activity)”, “Environmental protection activities (ecological monitoring)”, “Equipment”, “Transport”, “Metallurgy”, “Power engineering”, “Forest industry”, “Chemical industry”, “Food industry”, “Light industry”, “Automation”, “Land management, geodesy, cartography and topography”, “Environmental protection», «Construction», «Forestry and park construction», «Quality assurance» and «Musical Art».
At the same time, for additional enrollment, the threshold values of centralized testing required for submitting documents to the university have been reduced. Applicants who scored from 5 points (inclusive) in Russian and Belarusian languages; from 10 (inclusive) – in mathematics, physics, chemistry and biology; from 15 (inclusive) – in the History of Belarus, World History of Recent Times, Social Studies, Geography, foreign languages (English, German, French, Spanish) can apply for vacant places.
Further reductions have been made to the admission scores for higher education institutions subordinate to the Ministry of Defense and the State Border Committee, as well as for military faculties, for specialties in the field of “Physical Culture and Sports” and groups of specialties “Crop Production, Storage, and Processing”, “Animal Husbandry. Fish Farming. Beekeeping”, “Rural Construction and Territory Improvement”, “Melioration and Water Management”, “Agroengineering”. For these fields, marks from 0 to 2 points (inclusive) in all academic subjects have been deemed unsatisfactory for admission.
Alexander Kutynko, "Vitebskiye Vesti"