Education is a fundamental human right and essential for the exercise of all other human rights. It flourishes individual freedom and empowerment and generates important benefits. Education is a powerful tool by which economically and socially marginalized adults and children can lift themselves out of poverty and participate fully as privileged citizens.
Public universities in Bangladesh arrange admission test to judge the students’ merit before the enrollment. Academic results of previous examinations (SSC and HSC) are also considered in the admission procedure. There are some disputes regarding the importance of admission test besides the previous academic records.
The universities emphasize on the admission test while the government authorities ponder it as a burden for the students. It is notable that students with higher score in both SSC and HSC examinations had higher possibility to be eligible for enrollment. However, a vital proportion of applicants with GPA 5.00 in both examinations did not get success in merit and waiting position.
After completing 12-year formal education with HSC (Higher Secondary Certificate) exam, students try their best to get admitted into a public university for getting higher education with minimum cost. But there are approximately 57,000 seats available at public universities in Bangladesh. On the other hand, the number of admission seekers is many times more than the mentioned seats.
According to the existing provision in Bangladesh, students must sit in an admission test to enroll at a public university. However, there is a debate about the admission processes in the universities of Bangladesh. Some education experts think that the admissions test at university level is unnecessary. Their opinion is that students should get enrolled at universities based on their results of SSC and HSC levels.
However, other educationists believe that admission test must be required to examine their academic and intellectual performance and to select the best students. But the problem is that if any student fails to get chance at any public university common people think that the very student can never be successful anymore, which is the most dangerous problem at the present time. Public universities are definitely the best choice but it doesn’t mean that this is the only choice. There are many private universities in the country now and they are also giving a good competition to the public universities indeed.
Private universities started in Bangladesh from 1992 and a large number of graduates from private universities are doing very well in the public and private services. Even we find the equal position of private universities with public universities in international ranking. Jobs in the ICT, business management and corporate sectors are dominated by the graduates of private universities.
Though the maximum students and the parents believe that success lies on the admission at public university but now-a-days this perception is being changed on account of the brilliant achievement of the graduates of private universities. I should mention it again that the public universities in our country are definitely providing quality education and their graduates are doing much better than that of the graduates of private universities.
On the other hand, the contribution of the graduates of the private universities to the national and international arena is not insignificant either. Since there are not enough seats at public universities, the private universities should come forward with the lower cost for the higher education (with quality and excellence) with a view to reducing the pressure of the battle of admission test in public universities.
The writer is Assistant Professor, Department of English, Asian University of Bangladesh
