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The Ministry of Education has registered 15,000 requests for review of national exams so far, more than double the 6,200 requests registered in the first phase last year, the minister announced this Monday.
Fernando Alexandre promised that these requests “will be analyzed quickly, according to normal procedures,” and justified the increase with a “very important change” in the evaluation method.
The governor, speaking in Figueira da Foz, Coimbra district, where he inaugurated building 2 of the University of Coimbra campus, explained that the new method – in which different professors participate in grading each exam – allowed for “a very significant number” of grades between 9 and 9.4 (on a scale of 0 to 20).
“Last year we had practically no grades between 9 and 9.5, because there was only one teacher grading the exams. Now, since we add up the various answers that make up the exam and each grader grades without having a global view of the exam, resulting in a more objective assessment,” there are more grades that are just a few tenths away from passing (with 9.5 the student passes, with less they are prevented from applying to higher education).
According to the minister, there are 2400 exams with a grade of 9.4, so it is natural that students, faced with this grade, request a review: “In fact, they are one tenth short of passing.”
“The system has the mechanisms to carry out this verification, which is precisely through reassessment, and therefore it is not surprising that this year, with this system, we have more reassessments,” he stressed.
Of the 290,000 tests, 20,000 have scores that fall within four tenths of a point of passing, “so it’s natural that there will be an increase in requests for reassessment,” the official added.
The number of requests for reassessment submitted so far is more than double the 6,200 requests from the entire first phase of 2025, but it could still increase, because the deadline for reassessing the exams of students who gained access to the exams later is still running.
According to the Minister of Education, on Sunday night there were still 170 students who did not know their final grade for the first phase of the exam (at a time when even the second phase of the exams had already ended), students who will then have two working days to request a review of their exams. Fernando Alexandre told journalists that among the 290,000 exams taken, 825 requests were registered with identification of discrepancies.
“I’m not downplaying it, but we’re talking about 825 out of 290,000,” emphasized the official, who said that each of the requests had already been analyzed and the reason for the non-compliance identified, which in some cases did not exist.
In cases where there were discrepancies, the Minister of Education said that they are being corrected and “there are very few cases left to correct, which should be resolved between today and tomorrow [Tuesday]”.
For the first time this year, nearly 300,000 national secondary school exams were assessed digitally, but the process experienced several technical glitches, forcing the release of grades to be postponed for a few days.
The Minister of Education has acknowledged the problems, but assures that no student will be harmed.
The authorities decided to postpone the release of the results of the first phase from July 14th to July 17th, but the grades were only posted in schools that evening, and many students had to wait a few more days to find out their results. The second phase of the national exams also started later, taking place between July 21st and 24th.
Despite these delays, the Ministry maintained the application schedules for the first phase of the national entrance exam for higher education, which ends on August 6th, and created a special exam period, which will take place between September 3rd and 8th.
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