Islamic Imam Hatip high schools suffer in bachelor's program entrance

Duvar English

Only one sixth of Islamic Imam Hatip high schools' alumni were able to enter a bachelor's program in the 2020 national Higher Education Entrance Exams (YKS), daily Birgün reported on August 28.

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Some 238,391 Imam Hatip seniors applied to take the YKS, and 39,127 of them scored high enough to be placed in bachelor's programs, while 31,817 of them scored well enough to be placed in two-year degrees.

Social sciences high schools had the most successful alumni in the YKS with 54 percent of them scoring well enough to enter bachelor's programs. On the other hand, 49 percent of science high school graduates were placed into bachelor's programs.

Vocational high schools, where students master a chosen set of skills, had the lowest rate of entry for bachelor's programs in 2020.

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'Education policies are unsuccessful'

The generally low rate of success in the YKS is a display of poor policy-making by the Education Ministry, Education and Science Workers’ Union (Eğitim-Sen) Higher Education Secretary Özgür Bozdoğan said.

"The government's policy is basically to direct students toward imam hatip schools and vocational schools...But the reality is that only 16.4 percent of the alumni of İmam Hatip high schools get into bachelor's programs," Bozdoğan said.

"This begs the question: What are the rest of the 83.6 percent [of İmam Hatip high school graduates] supposed to do?"

Bozdağan said that the Turkish education system should allow all students to choose the kind of education they want to receive, which will increase success rates.