In Belarus, the application period for contract students to universities ended July 2, 2025. A week earlier, Sergey Pishchov, head of the Main Department of Vocational Education at the Ministry of Education, described contract admissions as a choice made by motivated applicants and enterprises.
"The admission cutoff scores only confirm that. That is, it is not a choice for those who could not enroll. . . . We are immediately recruiting this elite for the future of our enterprises," the official said on the BelTA YouTube channel on June 25.
Under the contract admission system, applicants agree to work at a specific enterprise for at least five years after graduation in exchange for state-funded tuition. Admission requirements for contract students are lower than for regular applicants: they need to take only one exam and have a grade-point average of at least 7. For about 50 programs that the state considers particularly important (for example, kindergarten teachers and veterinarians), contract students are admitted without any exams.
To fact-check the official’s comments, the WTF team analyzed 2024 cutoff scores at the Belarusian National Technical University, Belarusian State University and the Medical University. If contract students are the elite, their results should be higher than those of regular applicants. But comparing scores directly is incorrect: contract students take one exam, regular applicants take three, plus everyone’s high school diploma grade is included. The maximum score for contract students is 200 points; for regular applicants, 400. Therefore, we halved the cutoff scores for regular applicants.
The data we obtained refute Pishchov’s statements. At Belarusian State University, contract students posted better results in only 13 of 28 majors — fewer than half. At BNTU, contract students posted higher scores in only one out of five majors. At the Medical University, contract students posted lower scores across all programs, even though they are allocated 75% of the publicly funded seats.
