President to sit with VCs soon

The initiative has been taken to reduce hassles of admission seekers and their guardians, University Grants Commission officials have said.
The president, also the chancellor of all 37 public universities, has taken the initiative against the backdrop of the government’s failure to introduce what it terms ‘cluster’ admission system for public universities in the past seven years, the UGC official said.
The education ministry in 2010 decided in principle to hold the group tests for a cluster of universities to cut down the cost of holding exams, reduce pressure on students and undermine the influence of coaching centres.
Under the suggested system, related institutions – such as all science and technology universities or all agricultural universities – would have group tests. Currently, all public universities host separate admission tests.
‘President [Abdul Hamid] on Tuesday said that he would soon sit with vice-chancellors of all public universities to discuss unified admission test system for them,’ UGC chairman Abdul Mannan told New Age on Wednesday. 
He informed that the president, while talking to the UGC chairman on the sidelines of the first convocation of National University at Bangabandhu International Conference Centre in Dhaka on the day, had said that he would hold the talk soon.
In November last year, while attending a programme at UGC, the president had suggested holding public university admission tests centrally.
Hamid had then observed that admission seekers and their guardians faced hassles as regards accommodation, food and transport to take part in admission tests in different universities. 
Many admission seekers being sick even return home without appearing in the tests, he lamented. 
Besides, many guardians cannot afford sending their children to different cities across the country to take part in university admission tests, he said.
Public universities in the country are situated in 19 cities or districts. Of which nine are situated in Dhaka, four each in Chittagong and Gazipur, two each in Mymensingh, Khulna and Rajshahi and one each in Gopalganj, Barisal, Rangpur, Comilla, Dinajpur, Kushtia, Jessore, Tangail, Noakhali, Patuakhali and Rangamati.
The University Grants Commission in their 
annual reports in 2010, 2012 and 2013 termed the current admission system ‘questionable’ and ‘expensive’ and recommended reforms. 
The UGC report 2012 said that a student needed to take six to 10 admission tests under the present system.
A UGC study in May 2013 found that an admission seeker had to spend an average of Tk 43,100 for coaching and other related expenditure.
The study found that 93 per cent of admission seekers take coaching classes to get admitted to higher education institutions.
Students need to buy admission forms at a cost Tk 400 to Tk 500 each and they have to spend a handsome amount on travelling to universities to sit for the admission tests.
Now admission test for public and private medical colleges is being held centrally. 
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