On August 17 in expert club "Pure Politics" the representatives of Polissya Fund for International and Regional Studies held a press conference in the framework of the Chernihiv regional project "Public monitoring of 2011 admission campaign" which is maintained by OPORA and supported by the Education Program of the International “Renaissanse” Fund and Program for assistance to independent testing in Ukraine (USETI Alliance).
According to Vice President of the Polissya Fund Yuriy Vdovenko, the purpose of the project is an objective assessment of admissions in 2011 and promoting the rights of entrants. This year the monitoring of admission procedures was conducted in two universities of the region - Chernihiv National Pedagogical Universit of T. Shevchenko (CHNPU) and Chernihiv State Institute of Economics and Management (CHDIEU). In general, OPORA observers worked in 38 universities in 16 regions. The project was aimed at analyzing of admission rules in the universities, monitoring the application procedure and publication of rating lists tracking of the work of IC "Competition" and members of admissions committees on the rights of entrants. Considerable attention was paid to direct communication with entrants and their parents to identify problems in admission and violations of the rights of graduates.
According to the project coordinator of OPORA in Chernihiv region Eugene Romanenko, the outstanding feature of this year's admission process was the low number of entrants. Number of graduates in Ukraine in 2011 decreased by 42.1%, in Chernihiv region - 42%.The average share of graduates of past years, who decided to become students this year was 16%. In 2011, Chernihiv Pedagogical University got 30% less applications for full-time education than in 2010, and the Institute of Economics and Management - 45% less. Consequently, the graduate in 2011 was in more advantageous competitive situation compared with previous years even with the decline in state demand.
Overall, this year's admissions in the Chernihiv region OPORA observers characterize primarily as transparent, open and, as such, without any disorders. Unlike previous years, the tension was much lower. Application procedures, publication of the rating lists were timely, orderly and in accordance with applicable law.
There were no graduates who passed entrance exams in Chernihiv State Institute of Economics and Management. In Chernihiv National Pedagogical University of T. Shevchenko about 200 graduates were allowed to pass creative tests, and nearly 14 people – to pass entrance exams. According to members of the admission board, not all applicants who were given the opportunity to pass internal exams came for them.
"During the admissions process on information boards of the admissions committees we placed announcement, which proposed applicants to apply to OPORA observers in case of violation of their rights, we constantly communicated with entrants and their parents on the admission procedures," - said Maxym Koryavets, the OPORA observer.
The most problematic innovation of this year was the introduction of system “Electronic Admission-2011”. The main disadvantage lies in the lack of preparation, which led to technical errors. According to Eugene Romanenko, in the early days of the documents’ admission the observers recorded cases of applicants who submitted applications via the Internet and have not received confirmation of registration and had to personally attend the admission boards. In addition, the MES order number 961 of 19.10.2010 "On approval of the terms of admission to higher educational institutions of Ukraine," stated that the admission procedure should include the preliminary e-registration of the graduates’ applications, but the procedure itself is not defined. Accordingly, the universities also didn’t mentioned the procedure of electronic admission in their admission rules. One more curious fact is that in CHNPU, and CHDIEU only 5% of applications were received via electronic admission system. Communication of observers with students revealed that most applicants do not trust this innovation. So there is a need for popularization of electronic entry among the entrants, increasing the level of confidence in it. It should be done systematically and before the admission process.
Besides, according to observers, it is appropriate to extend the deadline of the documents filing after the announcement of the second and third lists of people recommended for nomination. For example, this year's "second wave" of publishing ratings was during the weekend that somehow limited the ability of entrants to submit original documents in time.
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