SSC, equivalent results: Low pass rate to leave nearly 1.35m seats vacant

A large number of seats in colleges and madrasahs across the country will remain vacant despite a pressure on renowned educational institutions for admission into higher secondary (HSC) level in the upcoming academic year.

This year, the pass rate in the Secondary School Certificate (SSC) and equivalent examinations dropped significantly. As a result, even if all the students who passed the exams are admitted to colleges or madrasahs, about 1.35 million seats will still remain vacant.

Seats remain vacant every year at the higher secondary level, but due to this year’s particularly poor results—the worst in recent years—the number of vacant seats will increase drastically.

Many colleges and madrasahs will not get the number of students they had hoped for, thus, many private colleges and madrasahs may face financial and other challenges.

Like previous years, the admission process is likely to be conducted online. Students have been admitted based on their SSC or equivalent exam results over the past several years.

A student can apply to a minimum of five and a maximum of 10 colleges or equivalent institutions, prioritising them in order, by paying a fixed application fee. A student is selected for admission to certain institutions based on merit, applicable quotas (if any), and preferences.

With the exception of a few institutions including Notre Dame College in Dhaka, all other colleges and madrasahs admit students into Class XI through this online process, which is centrally managed with technical support from Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology (BUET) under the Dhaka Education Board.

This process only applies to college and madrasah admissions. Admissions under the Technical Education Board are managed separately.

Regarding the admission process for this year, Dhaka Education Board chairman Khandakar Ahsanul Kabir told Prothom Alo over the mobile phone on Friday that a meeting will soon be held at the Ministry of Education. The final decision will be announced after that meeting.

However, a source at the Dhaka Education Board said that the admission process is likely to follow the previous method. Preliminary preparations are being made accordingly. Data on available seats for admission is nearly finalised.

The results of the SSC and equivalent exams were published on Thursday. Both the average pass rate and the number of highest scores (GPA-5) have dropped this year.

The number of institutions where all students failed also rose, while the number of institutions with a 100 per cent pass rate has fallen. The pass rate was 68.04 per cent under the nine general education boards - down from 83.77 per cent last year. This year, 38,827 fewer students achieved GPA-5 compared to last year.

Three factors contributed to the poor results: First, this year’s SSC examinees had limited access to classes over the past five years due to the Covid-19 pandemic and other disruptions. Second, the math pass rate dropped this year because the questions were ‘difficult’. Third, the answer scripts were assessed ‘more strictly’ compared to previous years.

This year, a total of 1,904,086 students registered for the exams under 11 education boards. Among them, 1,303,426 passed. That means more than 600,000 students failed the exams.

According to sources from Dhaka Education Board, there are over 2.66 million available seats in Class-XI in colleges and madrasahs across the country.

This data shows that even if all passing students enroll in colleges or madrasas—excluding technical institutions—there will still be around 1.35 million vacant seats in Class-XI.

The Dhaka Education Board alone has more than 540,000 seats available for Class-XI admission. Besides, Cumilla has around 260,000; Rajshahi, 386,000; Jashore, 220,000; Chattogram, 170,000; Barishal, 170,000; Sylhet, 141,000; Dinajpur, 328,000; Mymensingh, 135,000; and the Bangladesh Madrasah Education Board has about 328,000 seats.

An analysis of this data shows that many colleges will face a shortage of students this year.