In July, YÖK’s General Council decided to abolish the coefficient system, a move welcomed at the time by many who interpreted it as a groundbreaking step to end long-standing discrimination imposed on vocational school graduates, including those from religious imam-hatip high schools. The 8th Chamber of the Council of State, however, ruled late November to retain the system after the İstanbul Bar Association asked it to ensure the continuation of the system in which a lower coefficient is used to calculate the scores of graduates of vocational high schools on Turkey’s university admission exam, the Student Selection Examination (ÖSS).
YÖK appealed the court’s ruling last week. Discussing the appeal on Thursday, the Council of State Administrative Trials Board rejected the appeal. Commenting on the issue, YÖK President Yusuf Ziya Özcan said: “We were expecting that the court would accept our appeal, but it was rejected. We will make a new decision on Dec. 17 and will announce it to the public.”
