Konkoor applicants in the current Iranian calendar year (started March 21) show a decline, in line with the trend of the past six years.
The number reduced to 880,756 registered individuals from 1.03 million last year, more than half of whom were women, Khabaronline reported.
Konkoor is the Iranian University Entrance Exam derived from Concours in French. It is a standardized test used as one of the means to gain admission to higher education. In recent years a bill to gradually eliminate this exam was presented to the Majlis.
The waning trend of Konkoor over the years was a hint that the tiring test was on its way out, and as per the parliament bill in 2006, was set to be eliminated as of 2010. However, the bill never came into effect and after some modification, parliament tasked the Sanjesh Organization (Iran’s national educational assessment organization) to earmark 25 percent of each student’s high school performance in their Konkoor rating.
Despite efforts made in recent years to reform university selection criteria and to promote equal opportunities, Konkoor remains an obstruction to equal education access. The expansion of infrastructure and establishment of an “open” university known as Azad University where students can go in for higher education sans an admission exam, albeit by paying high tuition fee, also hampers students’ enthusiasm to study hard for Konkoor.
On the other hand, the memory-based exam has further encouraged massive brain drain from Iran and has created psychological and social problems such as anxiety, boredom, and hopelessness among the youth who fail the test.
