On Thursday and Friday, the website of Ministry of Higher Education was not working well due to myriads of visitors. After the announcement of the result of Kankour exam of 1391 in Persian calendar, tens of thousands of people in and outside of the country whether googled the site or directly opened it to see the result of their exams or their friends and families. It was only late afternoon that it resumed working normally as major number of students found out their results and stopped searching.
Definitely, during last three days and a week ahead, tens of thousands of families across the country may feel sorry for their relatives for remaining behind the doors of higher education. And thousands of students shed tears while seeing that they failed to score due number to find way to their prioritized faculties.
Meanwhile, the quotient of pain for those students who failed to find way to public universities is different. Students who tried their first chance likely try their best to make second chance next year and those who failed for the second time or third time have hope to take Kankour exam next year.
It should be noticed that Kankour exam is held once a year where almost all graduated students from high school take part to test their chance because public universities are free and moreover provide small amount of stipend for those students who follow their studies other than their own provinces.
After the collapse of Taliban regime, the number of students take part in such exam has increased to double digits. This year around 195,000 registered to take part in exams across the country which however is not a large number in comparison to neighboring countries and in proportion to total population, but such number shows tremendous development in comparison to previous years. From 195,000 according to ministry of higher education, 175,000 students took part in exam. And from 175,000 students, only 44,000 (25.5%) found way to higher education institutions. And according to statement of Obaidullah Abid, Minister of Higher education, around 30,000 found way to institutions under control of Ministry of Education where students study for two years and receive a diploma. After getting their diploma, they can study for two extra years in private universities in order to get their degree.
In other words, 101.000 (58%) students would not be able to follow their education in public universities though they can go to private universities. Unfortunately, due to high level of poverty, most of them give up study and that is a tragedy for the country that suffers from high rate of illiteracy.