Turkey fined over case on test changes for violating the right to education

STRASBOURG

Turkey has been fined 5,000 euros by the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) for violating the right to education after a complaint by a vocational school student was upheld.

The court said in its ruling made public yesterday that changing the university entrance exam coefficients applied to the marks of pupils at vocational schools after they had started their education violated their rights.

Bekir Güven Altınay enrolled at a vocational training college specialized in communication when graduates from vocational training colleges were able, after competing on an equal footing with graduates from ordinary sixth-form colleges, to apply to universities specializing in communication studies.

On July 30, 1998, the Higher Education Council issued a circular that introduced new rules on admission.

Altınay failed the communication studies faculty entrance examination and calculated that without the coefficient his marks would have been good enough to pass. There was a violation of the right to education “concerning the unforeseeable change in the rules,” according to court’s statement.