At the beginning of this year, the chancellor of justice stated that requiring students to declare a school preference during high school admissions is against the law. Schools may assess applicants' knowledge and skills but cannot impose other subjective criteria. In response, the Ministry of Education has drafted a bill that would once again allow high schools to require students to indicate their school preference. The aim is to reduce the workload of schools that must choose from a large pool of applicants. However, the proposal has raised concerns among parents.

"The planned system assumes that a ninth-grader will be able to accurately predict which school they're guaranteed to get into. They're also supposed to compare themselves to all the other applicants, but they simply don't have that information," said parent Tiina Ilus.

According to Ilus, this could lead to a situation where, on June 9, a student finds out they weren't accepted to their first-choice school and can't attend their second-choice either because that school admitted only students who had listed it as their top preference. She believes the proposal is poorly thought out, as it's still unclear what will happen to students who don't get into their preferred schools or how they'll even find out where there are still available spots. Schools, however, are largely in favor of the change, as it would allow them to interview fewer applicants.

"We would prefer this system, because we have so many candidates and it would let us focus on those who actually want to come here," said Maria Kurisoo, head of studies at Tõnismäe State High School. "If we can't fill all the spots with first-choice applicants, then we'll reach out to those who listed us as a second or third choice."

Kurisoo noted that it's not always possible to fill every spot in the first round. For example, last year, the final admissions list wasn't confirmed until early July.

According to the Ministry of Education, listing a school as a top preference would simply grant an applicant one additional point in the admissions process.

"That extra point comes into play essentially when it's time to send out invitations. Schools will first send them to the applicants who have shown the most interest in attending. The extra point doesn't outweigh a very strong applicant's high entrance exam score, even if they didn't list that school as their first choice," explained Ülle Matsin, head of the general education policy department.

Matsin said the bill is still being refined. It's not yet clear whether schools will be allowed to ask for preference declarations as early as spring, as the law might not be passed in time.

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