BM 68 – Not-binding admission test in Flanders, Belgium
The new Flemish government (2014-2019) has a lot of attention for the bridge between secondary school and higher education. Research showed that the choice for higher education is often a struggle caused by, among others reasons, unprepared decision making.
To facilitate the orientation of students towards their first year of university, the government decided to introduce not-binding admission tests. This test is supposed to give an insight on the students’ competences in relation to the chosen education and has to encourage students to make a more informed decision. The aim of this test is to shorten the student trajectories. VVS recognises that not-binding admission tests can have a positive influence on the orientation of students. Nevertheless, this is not a magic solution and we urge the government that this has to be implemented in the broader context of a strong orientation framework. The student has to be central in this approach and this can never be reduced to an austerity measure. Furthermore we fight for the freedom of choice of education, which currently exists. ESU supports VVS in the fact that the orientation test can never remove the freedom of choice in the Flemish educational system neither serve as an austerity measure.