On August 25, Minsk / Yulia Vanina - BELTA/. 92.9 thousand people became students of Belarusian higher education institutions of all forms of ownership. This was announced at a press conference by the Minister of Education, Alexander Radkov, as reported by a BELTA correspondent. According to the minister, this is almost 3 thousand more people than in 2008. "In addition, it should be taken into account that the enrollment of 3.9 thousand applicants for distance learning in agricultural universities will be completed in December," said Alexander Radkov. 80.5 thousand students were enrolled in state-owned universities, and 12.4 thousand people in private ones. 33 thousand students will study at the expense of the budget. This year, 305 people were enrolled without entrance examinations, and 598 were admitted out of competition. Traditionally, among children admitted out of competition, orphans and children left without parental care predominated. Children with disabilities (167 people), graduates of general education schools with gold and silver medals (2126), graduates of secondary vocational and vocational-technical schools who graduated with honors (242), and others passed the general competition. 1904 people were admitted on a targeted training basis. 188 citizens of other states also became students of Belarusian universities, including 136 citizens of Russia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan. "Admission rules, as well as the admission campaign itself, are one of the most important issues of public concern, because children will always want to receive a decent education, and parents will always want to provide them with such opportunities," said Alexander Radkov. At the same time, he emphasized that competitive selection cannot be canceled, because the country needs excellent, highly qualified specialists, not just graduates with diplomas. According to the Minister of Education, this year it became obvious that rural applicants are no longer inferior to urban ones; they are admitted with higher scores and often prepare themselves without tutors. "This year, we monitored the centralized testing in the regions, and the results surprised us. Grodno and Brest regions, in terms of the scores obtained by applicants taking the CT in the universities of these regions, were not inferior to Minsk; in some regional universities, these indicators were even higher," he said.-0-

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