A group of students held a protest march from Yerevan State University toward the government building. An action was scheduled to be held in front of YSU building before the march, but there was no increase in the number of students after nearly an hour and the group was forced to start the march with 100 students.
The student march was against the reduction of spots for Master's and PhD degrees. The students demand getting back the indicators of last year and allow students to receive a normal education. As 4th year student of Physics at YSU Daniel Ioannisyan told "A1+", the lack of the number of students is due to the heavy rainfall, as well as the YSU administration's and student council's consistent efforts aimed at leading the action to failure.
Participating in the action were mainly students from the faculties of physics, mathematics and radio-physics at YSU and these are the faculties where there are a majority of boys. According to Daniel Ioannisyan, the most ridiculous part of it is that the students participating in the action were those who were not affected by the reduction and were only there for their ideas.
He also stressed that there have been double reductions in all other faculties, except for the physics faculty. The reason, according to him, was because the students of this faculty had previously met with RA Minister of Education and Science Armen Ashotyan.
"It turns out that the students of every faculty must organize separate demonstrations, meet with the minister the following day and receive spots in return. To some extent, that can be considered to be the physics faculty's victory, but not everyone's victory. That was absolutely not a victory for me. Keeping the spots is temporary."
Then, the students marched toward the RA Ministry of Education and Science where they met with Head of the Department of information and public relations at the ministry Artur Baghdasaryan. He suggested the students meet with Deputy Minister Ara Avetisyan, but the students refused, saying their demand was clear and they didn't want to discuss anything. The ministry representative suggested presenting their demands in written form and submitting them to the minister. The students marched from the Ministry with calls for "restoration" and "right to study" toward the government building where they were greeted by the police.
The action participants were demanding a meeting with the RA Prime Minister, but they met with Head of the Department of Letters and Citizens Reception at the RA Government Alexander Ghazaryan who also suggested that the students submit their demands in written form and quickly left. Offended by the government official's indifference, the students decided to hold another protest next week until the issue was solved.
