Education Minister: SAIS Ready for 2027 Implementation, Estonian Language Exam to Change

Education Minister Kristina Kallas announced that the long-awaited admission system SAIS is finally ready and will be introduced next year. Additionally, plans are in place to abolish the Estonian as a second language state exam and bring all students to a single Estonian language exam at different proficiency levels.

Education Minister Kristina Kallas announced in the programme "Reporteritund" that the long-awaited admission information system SAIS is finally ready and will begin operating next year. The system is designed to simplify the admission process for primary school graduates and has experienced multiple delays over the years.

The introduction of SAIS means that admission to secondary schools and vocational institutions will become more uniform and transparent than before. The new system allows students to submit applications to different schools in one place and monitor the admission process in real time.

Language Exam Reform

A groundbreaking change is also the plan to abolish the Estonian as a second language state exam. Kallas explained that from now on, all students, regardless of their native language, would take the Estonian language exam, but at different proficiency levels. This means that students from Estonian-language schools and children from non-Estonian-speaking families will no longer take separate exams at different times.

This change will make the exam schedule significantly more flexible and break the former symbolic divide where native speakers took one exam and students with a different language background took another. The goal of the new approach is to support language learning and integration, and to recognise that Estonian language proficiency is necessary for everyone.