Test students on abridged syllabus for university, medical college admission: Dipu Moni

Education Minister Dipu Moni wants university and medical college admission exams to be set and marked on the shorter syllabi of the SSC and HSC tests amid the pandemic.

Speaking after the results for the HSC and equivalent exams were published on Sunday, she said the authorities are already discussing the idea.

“We think it is logical to hold the admission exams on the syllabi the HSC and equivalent exams took place,” she said.

“I don’t think [any university] will hold [admission exams] outside that. If they want to, we’ll ask them [not to]…

As COVID-19 forced all education centres to be bolted in 2020, students were evaluated based on their JSC and SSC results. Students also enrolled into university and medical colleges through the result but exams were held on the original syllabus.

The 2021 HSC exams were held in December after being pushed back eight months due to the pandemic.

The assessments consisted of six papers from an abbreviated syllabus of three elective subjects. Students got one and a half hours to finish the exams instead of the usual three as the number of questions was cut.

Compulsory subjects, such as Bangla and English, were assessed based on students’ performance in previous public exams.

However, higher studies academies are keen to hold exams on the complete syllabus.

Dipu Moni argued that putting anything in the admission tests outside the syllabi the students sat for will be “unfair” to them.

Dipu Moni, who was a medical student herself, said truncating the syllabus for admission into medical colleges was discussed with the Medical Education and Family Welfare Division and BMDC, but did not reveal any decision.

But she mentioned that authorities at universities that held cluster exams have agreed to the proposal.

“We also spoke with Dhaka University. They will give us a decision. And others who were not part of the cluster exams, around four to five universities, will also come to a resolution on this.”

The education minister thinks the higher pass rate in this HSC will not end up causing a seat crisis in higher education.

“Some will now go to universities, some will move directly into professional life and others will choose technical education. I don’t think there will be any crisis for seats.

“We have the [public universities], the new ones that are being established and other technical educational institutions… we have many colleges in the country.”

“Some of them also offer honours and master’s courses. Many seats go empty every year.”.

She also brought up some institutions that have more than specified students.

“We tend to press for more educational institutions but don’t consider the bigger picture to assess whether we really need more seats or not.”

“We can’t increase the [number of seats] around the country in such a manner that there will be many universities with no students at all. These institutions are still there.”

She referred colleges that have “more students than the largest universities”, and said, “In some famous institutions at Dhaka, the students are huddled together. That we don’t want.”

On maintaining quality education in all institutions, she said, “We believe that we’ll be able to resolve this issue through the steps we took, which include training university teachers.”

Dipu Moni also touched on reasons for the record pass rate, saying subject mapping and abridged syllabus catalysed it.

“Maybe students were able to prepare much better because of the shorter syllabi and fewer subjects. That’s why they did much better.”

“Why are we so dissatisfied with good results. I don’t understand it. Don’t we want our children to do well? Don’t we hope to see a time when everyone does well, everybody passes? Why not?”