Kyiv, 12 June 2014 – This year the Independent External Assessment (IEA) for Donbas high school graduates will take place from 1 to 15 July. All will be granted the opportunity to pass it, though the expected number of graduates is lower compared to that of the last year, reported Serhiy Kvit, Minister of Education and Science of Ukraine, during the briefing in Ukrainian Crisis Media Center. “For now the first session of IEA is underway, it started on June 3. The second testing session will take place from 1 to 15 July. Everyone who did not manage to make it in time and has registered accordingly will be able to pass the IEA in July. At the moment we do not observe massive transfer of students from Donbas to other Ukrainian universities. I personally receive messages from students via social networks asking “How can I transfer to another university?”, “Who do I have to address?” Together with regional education units we control these processes and solve the relevant issues that arise,” noted Serhiy Kvit.
7 thousand of high school graduates from Donetsk and Luhansk regions have registered to pass the Independent External Assessment in other regions of Ukraine. Mister Kvit added that earlier in 2014 over 35 thousand of high school graduates from Eastern regions of Ukraine registered to pass the IEA. At the same time only 600 graduates from Crimea have registered to pass the Assessment. According to the Minister it is hard to explain a tendency toward the decrease of the number of high school graduates who intend to enter Ukrainian universities. “Maybe they simply decided not to enter,” assumed Head of the Ministry of Education and Science of Ukraine.
The Minister also underlined that this year the entry campaign to universities for the high school graduates from Crimea and Donbas will be flexible taking into account annexation of Crimea and current situation in Luhansk and Donetsk regions. “If the graduates will not be able to pass the testing during the second session, third session will be organized in the universities which the graduates aim to enter,” noted Serhiy Kvit.
Answering the question on reforming the education system the Minister reported that next week the Bill “On higher education” will be considered by Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine. “I very much hope that the Parliament will support this legislative initiative in the second reading. Ukrainian education system needs urgent reforms and the respective law will help to facilitate them. We will keep supporting universities and programmes of high quality,” stated Minister Kvit.
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