The year 2008 will be remembered in Bulgaria as the year when high school matriculation exams were re-introduced. Students and parents have voiced strong objections on the matter to Education Minister Daniel Vulchev, who decided to enforce the exams again after a break of more than 50 years.

Both students and parents complained that they did not have enough time to prepare for the exams, and that they put them in an unfavourable position compared with the next generations of students. The students complained that they had not been well enough prepared for the exams because of the different types of education at different schools. Parent associations even threatened to take the case to court, calling it a form of discrimination.

The exams have not been taken well by universities, either, who claimed that levels of school education were different all around Bulgaria and that the matriculation exams would not serve as acceptable entrance criteria.

All sides asked the ministry to postpone the matriculation exams at least by a year, something Vulchev refused to do.

He met all these accusations with little sympathy and it seems that this summer, high school students will have to take the test if they want to have a high school diploma and a possible future in one of the country’s state-owned universities.

For the purpose, in February, the Ministry of Education published a list of 51 Bulgarian universities, each with its own entrance exams criteria, directly tied to this year’s introduction of the high school exit exams. According to a decision taken by the ministry in 2007, universities had to come up with a list of majors for which the results from the matriculation exams would serve as entrance exam results.

For example, a high school exit exam in Bulgarian literature would serve as an entrance exam for a major in education at Sofia University Saint Kliment Ohridski. A matriculation exam in mathematics would get a student a chance to study chemistry, physics, nuclear energy, astronomy or meteorology at Sofia University as well. The university, however, has reserved separate entrance exams for some of the majors traditionally attracting the most interest: law, journalism, economics and IT.

Many other universities have done the same. For example, the University of National and World Economy in Sofia has decided to accept matriculation exam results only in Bulgarian literature, which will serve only as an entrance exam in journalism, a subject far removed from the university’s economics focus. This means that students who want to study anything related to economy at the university would have to take a separate exam organised by the university. The first matriculation exams have been scheduled for June 3 this year. The second matriculation exams will be held on September 2.

The matriculation exams will be given in foreign language, mathematics, physics, astronomy, health care, chemistry and environment, Bulgarian history, geography, economics and philosophy. The ministry’s idea was that the exams would cut down on the practice of each university having its own entrance exams, which, until now, has resulted in candidates touring the country for two weeks every summer in order to take the exams organised by the universities.

Another reason was to stop the practice of teachers and university professors giving private lessons to students, which has grown into an industry of its own in the past 19 years and costs parents thousands of leva.

A major step in this direction was taken on May 16 when Parliament adopted, on second reading, amendments to the Education Act. The amendments referred mainly to matriculation exams. The MPs decided that principals, assistant principals, heads and employees in the regional educational inspectorates and municipal staff in the respective units would be prohibited from giving private lessons.

Teachers who give such lessons now have to fill in a declaration addressed to the respective principal within a one-month term before the start of the school year. If teachers fail to file such a declaration, they will be subject to disciplinary actions.

Published as part of the Education in Bulgaria special feature of The Sofia Echo, May 23 2008