Alexander Karalevich: The absence of entrants’ competition teaches students irresponsibility

At Belarusian Pedagogical University, there is very low demand for some specialties. There are faculties where everybody who submitted their documents has become students of a budgetary (free-of-charge) form of education. «Such students do not feel any...

At Belarusian Pedagogical University, there is very low demand for some specialties. There are faculties where everybody who submitted their documents has become students of a budgetary (free-of-charge) form of education. “Such students do not feel any responsibility for their training at all” - Alexander Karalevich, chief executive of the Educational Center “POST”, told the EuroBelarus Information Service.

"As for the Pedagogical University, this sad tendency has been observed for a long time yet. I graduated from this higher education establishment in 2002, and I can tell you that there was a very good level of education then. I applied for history there, and there was a competition of several people for one place. However, right after that the competition started "to spoil". And then it has come to the situation when there is no competition at all - of course, it is rather sad", - said the expert.

In certain cases, it was enough for entrants to receive 80 points out of possible 400! Thus, among those who dream to become teachers of physics in the future, 4 people have received less than 90 points, and one person has entered with the result of less than 71 points.

"It would be less harmful if these students would study for the sake of their diplomas and then would go wherever they would like to. But they will have to work at schools - there will be an appointments committee that will necessarily distribute them among schools! It is a real challenge for faculties; it will not be easy for tutors to justify them because if people have passed the competition, at least, they have proved that they are better than others and have the right to study there. However, if everybody who applied was enrolled, then such students have no sense of responsibility. They simply came - submitted their documents - and started to study. And for tutors, I think, it will be difficult enough to work with such students", - Karalevich believes.

A similar situation is observed at Belarusian State University where all entrants of eight faculties have become students who pay for their education. And among them - there is such a prestigious one as the Department of Journalism.

"I think it has to do with the fact that nowadays everyone is bothered very much by appointments, and journalists are very diligently distributed among different newspapers in remote districts. There is a feeling that it will not be a very pleasant job. Perhaps, people have no desire to apply for journalism because there are no prospects. In Belarus, there are no large mass media in which it would be really possible to build one’s career. Neither printing, nor Internet editions; no radio. The picture is quite dismal here", - noted Alexander Karalevich.

He has also added that the absence of entrants’ competition and the shortage of students could be caused, inter alia, by objective reasons - such as a decrease of the total number of enrollees.