Universities sparked Syrian anger... “specializations restricted to males”

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The conditions for admission to some universities, which were announced by the Ministry of Higher Education in Syria some time ago, restricting a number of specializations to males, raised criticism and fears of narrowing women’s opportunities in education and work.

On September 30, the Ministry announced the admission requirements for the current academic year within a mechanism known as “preference,” to distribute students to universities and institutes according to their grades in high school and their desires. The restrictions included programs at two universities specialized in military and security sciences created by the authorities last July, including the legal sciences program at the National University of Defense Sciences.

But both universities still accept female students in other programs. Moreover, the current conditions do not prevent women from studying law, engineering, and media, which remain available to them in institutions, including the University of Damascus.

In addition, the restrictions also included civil institutions, including the specialty of radio and television directing at the Media Institute in Idlib.

The Ministry also allocated some oil and gas institutes for males this year, and specializations remained available to female students at Damascus University, the largest in the country, according to what was reported by Agence France-Presse.

However, a former official in the ministry explained that not all of these restrictions are new.

Despite this, it sparked criticism from many Syrians on social media.

Meanwhile, the nanny, Ahlam Othman, considered it “an additional stumbling block in the face of women in Syria.” She said, "This is additional discrimination against Syrian women who already suffer from discrimination and persecution, and it must not be tolerated," according to what was reported by Agence France-Presse.

Meanwhile, student Israa Salloum, who is preparing to apply for selection, said, “No one has the right to force me to choose a specific major or exclude me from a specific major.”

On the other hand, users of social media platforms defended the conditions, pointing out that there are other options available to females.

This controversy came after the decision of the prestigious “Al-Hurriya Institute” school in Damascus to separate male and female students in the middle and high school levels last month. Note that its administration denied the existence of an official directive behind it. She confirmed that the decision was taken for the benefit of the students after observing many disagreements and incidents that distracted the students’ focus.