The Bar Association called on Thursday for the «immediate suspension of the current deadlines» for the first phase of higher education entrance examinations until all students have an «official mark and a full copy» of their exam papers.
«The measure that best safeguards the principle of equality is the immediate suspension of the current deadlines for the first phase and the subsequent ranking and placement procedures,» reads an opinion, to which Lusa had access, that the President of the Bar Association and the General Council of the Bar Association issued at the request of the Missão Escola Pública movement.
The professional association also considers that this preventive measure «is preferable to the alternative of mass legal proceedings», since «finalising the ranking with unstable marks would lead to hundreds of interim injunctions being issued by different administrative courts, with potentially divergent criteria, thereby fragmenting the national unity of the competition and exacerbating the inequality that the measure is intended to prevent».
In the Bar Association’s view, the suspension should «preserve all validly submitted applications», be as short as possible and end only when the «systemic anomalies in digitisation, association, processing and communication» have been definitively resolved.
Finally, «a new, common and sufficient period would be opened for all candidates to submit, confirm or amend their applications».
«It is not necessary to wait for the conclusion of any scientific review or potential litigation: it is necessary to eliminate the extraordinary uncertainty attributable to the system and to ensure that everyone receives an official ranking and a full copy,» maintain João Massano and the body over which he presides.
«In summary, the constitutionally correct sequence of operations is: to consolidate the assessments, provide everyone with equivalent information and deadlines, and only then proceed with ranking and placement in the first phase of access to higher education,» the opinion concludes.
In the document, the professional association also opposes considering a «general annulment of the exams or their automatic replacement with internal marks», arguing that this would be excessive and «could create new inequalities».
Meanwhile, «reopening the process exclusively for candidates identified as affected is», in the Bar Association’s view, «less transparent and may result in different timeframes and information being provided in a procedure with relative effects».
Missão Escola Pública submitted the request for an opinion on 20 July and asked the Bar Association to comment on the effects «of the disruptions that occurred in the digital marking process» of the national examinations «on equal opportunities for students sitting the national entrance examination for higher education».
The opinion was issued based on current information as of 25 July.
For the first time this year, nearly 300,000 secondary school national examinations were marked digitally, but the process experienced several technical glitches, forcing the release of results to be postponed by a few days.
The minister of education has acknowledged the problems but has said every pupil will be protected from disadvantage.
The Ministry decided to postpone the release of the first-stage results until 17 July, but schools only displayed the marks in the evening, and many students had to wait a few more days to find out their results. The second stage of the national exams also began later, from 21 to 24 July.
Despite these delays, the Ministry has maintained the application deadlines for the first phase of the national higher education entrance examination, which closes on 6 August, and has introduced a special examination period from 3 to 8 September.
