Estonia to change upper secondary school admissions system
In Estonia, admissions to upper secondary and vocational schools next spring will be conducted according to a unified calendar through the updated SAIS system. Minister of Education and Research Kristina Kallas said the changes are intended to make the procedure more organized after this year's problematic admissions campaign, when almost 1,900 basic school graduates had not yet been admitted to either an upper secondary or vocational school a week before the start of the academic year, ERR News reports.
Unified schedule and priority system
Schools will continue to set their own requirements for applicants, but all institutions will follow a common schedule. Students will submit applications through Estonia's unified admissions information system, SAIS, and indicate the priority of their chosen institutions.
The SAIS system was also planned for use this year, but this was abandoned in February due to problems with the new SAIS3 version. According to Kallas, the system has already undergone load testing, and schools can enter their admissions requirements in the test environment. The system is expected to fully open to schools in January.
Applications can be submitted from March 29 to May 18. Students will be allowed to choose an unlimited number of schools, although the minister acknowledged that this could complicate the choice. At the same time, ranking applications will allow schools to see applicants who placed them first and invite them to interviews first.
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Admissions are planned to be completed earlier
The results of basic school graduation exams will be entered into the Estonian Education Information System on May 17. After that, students will have one day to review and adjust the priorities in their applications before schools begin sending offers.
Institutions must begin sending admission offers no later than June 11, while the main admissions stage will last until July 2. Kallas urged applicants to accept offers promptly, as this year students with the highest results received offers from several schools and took a long time to decide, while others waited for decisions throughout the summer.
By July 5, an interim review of available places will be conducted. An additional admissions stage is expected to begin no later than July 15 and end on August 23 — one week earlier than this year. Students who have still not been admitted to an upper secondary or vocational school by then will be able to reapply for vacant places on equal terms. The updated SAIS3 is also expected to display in one place a list of institutions that still have places available.
