High Education

    High school education in Bulgaria quite often refers to secondary education since there are two types of secondary schools – General secondary education schools and Professional Schools. There are many high schools which are profiled in different fields as Mathematics, Languages, Economics, Humanities and others. Usually, students apply for high school after their 7th grade at the age of 13-14. The admission procedures take into consideration marks from the matriculation examination in Mathematics and Bulgarian Language.
    In most schools, students are divided into two shift schedules – first (from morning till noon) and second (from noon till evening). During the school year, the students must have a certain number of grades, depending on the workload of the subject and they must pass an entry control test (in the beginning of the semester) and a final control test (at the end of the semester). As tests are not a common way of examination/evaluation, most teachers prefer different methods of testing students’ knowledge.
Secondary education in high schools covers 8th till 12th grade (termed ‘class’ in Bulgarian) when students have to pass matriculation exams in Bulgarian and Literature and one other subject, of their choosing. After they pass the state exams, they receive their secondary education diploma, which is a necessary part of the application package for a Higher Educational Institution.
It is good to know that most high schools in Bulgaria are public bodies. There are however some private ones even in the small cities.