Education in general schools is in a disastrous state, applicants cannot pass simple exams, 258 free places remain vacant – Mkhitaryan

This year’s entrance exams showed that the trend observed over the past 5-6 years — a decline in both the number of applicants and the number of students admitted to higher education institutions — has continued, education expert Atom Mkhitaryan said in an interview with Aysor.am.

According to him, another negative record was set this year: “The number of students admitted to higher education institutions is below 10,000. In 2021, we had 17,200. The number has declined year by year. The second sad figure is that only 58.4% of those applying to higher education institutions received a passing score in both exams and were admitted. Moreover, it should be taken into account that these applicants are the best students in their schools, and a significant number of them also studied with tutors. Yet you can see how disappointing the results are.” 

According to the specialist, all this is due to several factors. “The first factor directly related to the decline in the number of applicants is demographics. The number of young people is gradually decreasing, and this is also reflected in official data on the number of children born each year. This year, compared to last year, if I am not mistaken, about 10% fewer children were born,” Mkhitaryan said.

The second factor, according to him, is that many young people renounce their Armenian citizenship while still at school and leave for other countries because of the issue of military service.

“This also leads to a decrease in the number of applicants and, naturally, in the number of those admitted,” he said.

The third factor, according to Mkhitaryan, is the disastrous state of general education.

“This means that the quality of education in schools has declined so much that many graduating students cannot achieve at least 7.58 points in each exam to be admitted. This year, an unprecedented 258 free places were not filled and remained vacant, while the total number of vacant places is 3,100.

“In other words, school graduates cannot cope with simple exams in order to receive a passing score. This has simply reached catastrophic proportions. This means that the ‘reforms’ implemented by the current government in recent years have only resulted in a decline in the quality of education, while the number of people receiving higher education has decreased by about half,” the expert said.

According to Mkhitaryan, he has not seen the responsible authorities show the level of concern that this situation requires.

“The incompetence of decision-makers is affecting all of this. If they were at least somewhat competent, they would be able to make decisions that would contribute to the improvement and development of higher education and help stop the outflow of lecturers,” he said.