All Hungarian school-leaving certificates are of equal value

Since 1998, the school-leaving exams have been organised and conducted in all secondary schools according to the same regulations and requirements.

The content, examination dates and assessment of the four compulsory school-leaving examination subjects (Hungarian language and literature, mathematics, history, foreign language) are the same, regardless of the municipality of Hungary and the secondary school in which pupils take their school-leaving examination.

The content and assessment of the fifth compulsory elective examination and vocational examination in vocational education and training are also identical, and the examination dates are set uniformly throughout the country, they added.

The school-leaving certificate obtained at the technical school, they continued, could also be an advantage for admission to higher education. In this type of school, the compulsory school-leaving certificate subjects are taught with the same content and number of hours as at the upper secondary school, and students obtain a vocational qualification and a school-leaving certificate at the end of their studies at the same time. An additional advantage of the reformed vocational education and training system is that the technician exam is considered an advanced level school-leaving certificate and the technician diploma can be taken into account in the admission scoring, they added.

Applicants who have passed a vocational examination with a grade of at least good (4) in technical education may opt to have their admission points calculated by quadrupling the result of the vocational examination if they are pursuing further studies in a field relevant to their technical qualification. Depending on the result of the exam, this could give them up to 400 points in the admission procedure, they said.

It was also explained that under the new rules, students who achieve excellent results in the fifth year of vocational training may even be granted preliminary student status by the higher education institution with which they have a training partnership, making it easier for them to enter university. And the Diploma in Technician Training, which started two years ago, has the advantage that up to 30 credits can be credited towards higher education if the student continues on a specific course at the university.

So, overall, for 25 years there has been no substantive difference between the baccalaureate exams of secondary schools and those of vocational training institutions, and the baccalaureate exams taken at any educational institution after 1998 are of equal value, based on the same requirements and the relevant legal provisions, the ministry said in a statement.