College admissions to stress students' social background

Hungary's universities are placing increased emphasis on students' social background when awarding places to those bound for college, while language skills are being downgraded in importance.

According to a report in daily Népszabadság, the same weight will now be given to a students' status as coming from a disadvantaged background as if they had passed a language exam. Until now, passing a language exam counted for more in the rating system used to govern university admissions.

In the new scale, which will use a "400+80" point scale instead of the previous "120+24" point scale, both the language certificate and confirmation of a disadvantaged family background will be worth 50 points.

A spokesperson for the Education and Culture Ministry explained the change by saying that a new OECD survey showed that those students who have privileged economic and social backgrounds are 2.7 times more likely to succeed in an entrance exam than those whose parents had not finished high school, while the latter are similarly unlikely to have completed a language exam.

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