The lottery system for student selection and admission in schools will remain in place this year as well. This decision was made during a meeting held on Thursday afternoon at the Ministry of Education regarding the ‘Amendment of Admission Policies.’ The education adviser will be informed about this matter, and if he approves, the admission policies will be finalised and published.
An officer from the Directorate of Secondary and Higher Education (DSHE), who participated in the meeting, confirmed this information to Jago News.
He stated that there was a discussion about whether admissions would be conducted through a lottery or an examination. Considering the overall situation, the majority of members expressed their opinion in favor of retaining the lottery system this year as well. Thus, it has been decided to proceed with admissions through the lottery. The education adviser will be informed of this decision, and it will be published in the form of policies upon his final approval.
The principal of a school in Dhaka, who attended the meeting, mentioned that the lottery system is being maintained this year due to the interest of education administration officials. Speaking on condition of anonymity, he told Jago News that all the representatives from educational institutions who participated were in favor of admissions through examinations. However, there are more officials from the education administration and the ministry on the committee, and the majority of them support retaining the lottery system. Hence, the decision to admit students through the lottery will remain in effect.
He added, "We believe that relying on luck to admit students in the sixth, seventh, eighth, and ninth grades is not appropriate. This is acceptable at the primary level, meaning in the first, second, or third grades. For higher classes, there should definitely be an evaluation or examination-based admission system. We hope this will be implemented next year."
For several years, the government has been selecting students through a lottery system for admissions in public and private schools. This year, various educational institutions and parents raised the demand for student admissions to be based on merit assessment through examinations. After reviewing their requests, the Ministry of Education convened a meeting on Thursday to amend the admission policies, where it was decided to retain the lottery system.
Last year, there were 118,101 vacant seats in 658 government schools, while 563,013 applications were submitted. Meanwhile, there were 1,003,993 vacant seats in 3,188 private schools, with 310,779 applications received. Sources from the Directorate of Secondary and Higher Education have indicated that the number of seats may increase this year.