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The executive vice president of CRUCH, Rector Aldo Valle, highlighted that this year there will be one more day in the application period, as requested by the students.
The 2016 Admission Calendar and the Syllabi for the University Selection Tests (PSU) are available on the website of the Single Admission System and on the website of the DEMRE of the University of Chile.
With the presentation of the 2016 admissions calendar and the syllabi for the University Selection Tests (PSU), the executive vice president of the Council of Rectors, Aldo Valle, together with the executive director of the Unified Admissions System, Angélica Bosch, and the director of the Department of Educational Evaluation, Measurement and Registration (DEMRE) of the University of Chile, Sergio Carumán, launched the 2016 admissions process. Also present were members of the CRUCH Executive Committee: the alternate vice president and rector of the Catholic University of Maule, Diego Durán, the rector of the Federico Santa María University, Darcy Fuenzalida, and the rector of the University of La Frontera, Sergio Bravo.
“As every year, our purpose is to make this relevant information known as early as possible to all students preparing to access higher university education, so that they have this background information that allows them to perform expeditiously and with certainty in the different stages of the admission process,” explained Rector Valle.
Admission Calendar
Among these milestones, it is worth noting that the registration period for the PSU exam will begin next Monday, June 15, and will run until Friday, July 31. This means there will be a month and a half to register online.
Furthermore, the PSU exam will be administered on Monday, November 30th and Tuesday, December 1st, 2015. As usual, the Language and Communication test will be administered at 9:00 a.m. on the first day, followed by the Science test at 2:30 p.m. The following day, the Mathematics test will also be administered at 9:00 a.m., and the History, Geography, and Social Sciences test will be administered in the afternoon (2:30 p.m.).
The application period will begin on Sunday, December 27th and run until Thursday, December 31st. This means students will have five days to apply. This is one extra day compared to last year, addressing a need expressed by applicants themselves.
“This extended application period is a response to a concern expressed by students last year, which was also verified by the Unified Admission System. This represents an effort to improve the process, which is undoubtedly highly complex and requires coordination between the Ministry of Education, DEMRE (the Department of Measurement, Evaluation, and Educational Records), and universities. Students will be able to make more informed decisions, as these are not simple ones, and having an extra day will allow them to make better, more calm decisions,” explained Aldo Valle, who is also the rector of the University of Valparaíso.
The detailed schedule, which contains each of the stages of the 2016 admission process, is available from today on the website of the Single Admission System of the Council of Rectors and also on the DEMRE website.
Starting today, the syllabi for each of the University Selection Tests (PSU) will also be available on both websites. Regarding this, Rector Valle pointed out that although there are modifications compared to previous processes, “we cannot speak of changes in the content, since the school system predates the PSU. In 2009, the curriculum modification process began in secondary education, and it was established that the adaptation of the PSU to these changes would be gradual. This year marks the end of that transition, so we can assure you that all the test content is already in the school curriculum, and the PSU has simply adapted itself. If it didn't, then there would indeed be a problem.”.
Another point to note is that this year's PSU will again not penalize incorrect answers. This measure, which was implemented last year, means that only correct answers will be considered when calculating the corrected score. The five pilot questions will also remain in place for all tests.
Grade Ranking Adjustments
Another topic addressed in the presentation was the adjustments to the formula for calculating the Grade Ranking for this year, which was announced in August 2014. Until the previous admissions process, the formula only considered the school from which the student graduated in 12th grade, but starting with this admissions process, the student's entire academic record will be taken into account. This change means that all schools the student attended during their secondary education will be considered when calculating the Ranking Score.
This adjustment will eliminate the incentive to change schools in the final year of secondary education (4th year) to improve the ranking score, allowing for a more accurate assessment of the student's performance in their relative context, which is consistent with the spirit of this selection factor.
Regarding the number of students who changed schools during the last admissions process, Angélica Bosch, executive director of the Unified Admissions System, stated that “the information we obtained was that in 2014 there were 6,500 students nationwide who changed schools, but that doesn't necessarily mean they did so because of the ranking. We did detect that there were 1,500 cases involving students from schools that experienced a significant number of transfers, and of those, 770 correspond to students from prestigious schools.”.
Meanwhile, Aldo Valle explained that “the main element that gives meaning to the ranking is to reward merit, effort, and talent within the same socio-educational context, and when a student transfers to another school to improve their results, that objective is not met. This measure seeks to discourage students from transferring in their final year of high school and thus avoid the undesirable effect of diminishing the opportunities for other students who do not change schools.”.
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