A common admission test could worsen higher education access

News: Recently, a Common Undergraduate Entrance Test (CUET) for admission to 53 central universities has been introduced.

What is the Common Undergraduate Entrance Test (CUET)?

What is the difference between the Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT) and CUET?

Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT) is taken by high school students in the US. The CUET is modelled on SAT. American colleges use SAT test scores alongside high school results and other criteria for making admission decisions.

Under the NEP, the CUET results alone will decide college admissions. In this situation, the quality of schooling and efforts taken by parents to prepare children for the entrance exam would be vital for a good CUET score.

How will CUET worsen higher education access?

The exodus of students from government schools: According to the National Sample Survey’s 75th round on Household Social Consumption: Education, only 35% of children were studying in government schools in urban India in 2017-18, but in rural areas that proportion was around 72%.

Further, around 32% of parents who had enrolled children in a private school listed the inferior quality of education in government schools as the top reason for their decision and another 5% listed it as the second most important reason.

Hence, unless the revised school curriculum and its delivery in government schools improve, the CUET may lead to a further exodus of students away from state-run schools.

Additional expenditure to parents: Parents have to pay for ‘shadow schooling’ or private tutoring to ensure children don’t lag behind or gain a competitive edge over peers.

Parents with higher income levels can help their children with school work or afford tuition. Similarly, an inverted U relationship exists between mothers’ education and enrolment in private tuition.

Along with Joint Entrance Examination for engineering and National Eligibility Entrance Test for medicine, CUET will increase the tuition industry, undermining the core schooling system and students from poorer backgrounds and lower quality schools will affect further.

Source: This post is based on the article “A common admission test could worsen higher education access” published in Livemint on 16th June 22.