With the decision taken in the past days, the threshold scores of 150 for associate degree preference and 180 for undergraduate preference have been removed. With the decision taken, the placement score will be calculated by adding the secondary education success score for all candidates whose exam scores are calculated in the relevant score types as of this year. While most of the criticisms regarding the decision were about qualified students and education, it was stated that universities lost their meaning with the abolition of the thresholds.
UNIVERSITIES ARE STRATEGIC INSTITUTIONS, QUALIFIED STUDENTS ARE VERY IMPORTANT
While the problems in education became more and more chronic, the Council of Higher Education (YÖK) announced that it has lifted the 150 and 180 points threshold in the entrance examination to universities with its decision recently. Commenting on our newspaper about the decision taken, Bursa Uludağ University Faculty of Education, Educational Sciences Lecturer Prof. Dr. Selahattin Turan stated that more problems will be encountered in terms of quality, “Universities are strategic institutions. Qualified students who are selected for these institutions, are very important,” he said.
QUALITY SHOULD BE BROUGHT INTO THE FOREFRONT WHEN MAKE DECISIONS ON INSTITUTIONS
Expressing that the decision taken, may have been taken as a result of pressure, Turan stated that the vacant quotas had an effect on the decision, “The taken decision is a suitable decision for the policies implemented for mass higher education policies, that is, for everyone to graduate from a university. But I think that this decision was taken not because of being scientific, but as a result of the pressure of the universities whose quotas were not filled. However, the long-term negative consequences of these decisions must be analyzed in detail. Universities are the brain of society; Quality and qualification should be prioritized while making decisions regarding these institutions,” he added.
THE DECISION MAY CAUSE THE LOCALIZATION OF UNIVERSITIES
Emphasizing that universities have turned into a tool to control young people after the 1980 coup, Turan said, “The number of students who have already left their university education is very high, the vacant quotas are too high. Turkey's primary problem in education is not the threshold, but the interruption of secondary and higher education, dropouts, social justice and equality in education. Universities are the intellectual centers of a country. Studying in schools with quality will be beneficial. However, this decision may lead universities to localization so that it has no meaning.”