Turkey's Education Ministry to have AI prepare most questions in new common written exams

Turkey's Ministry of National Education (MEB) is preparing to put a "Common Written Exam System" into practice starting from the first term of the 2026-2027 academic year. Under the new model, an AI-supported system will produce most of the written exam questions. In a 10-question exam, the teacher will select only two questions, while the remaining eight will be generated by AI.

Which grades and subjects are covered?

In middle school, grades 5, 6 and 7 will be included for Turkish, mathematics, science, social studies, religious culture and moral knowledge, and English. In high school, grades 9, 10 and 11 will be covered in Turkish language and literature, mathematics, physics, chemistry, biology, history, geography, religious culture and moral knowledge, English and philosophy. Grade 8 students preparing for the LGS and grade 12 students preparing for the YKS will be left out.

The exams will also include open-ended questions. Afterwards, teachers will enter each student's score for every question into the system individually. In this way, measurement and assessment, from question preparation to analysis of results, will be carried out digitally. The ministry is said to aim at achieving uniformity across exams.

Criticism

The new arrangement has also drawn criticism because students from different socioeconomic backgrounds would be assessed with the same questions. Educator Özgür Bozdoğan argued that assessment should be determined by teachers according to the needs of each school and class. Stressing that conditions differ significantly even among state schools, Bozdoğan said it would not be right to assess a student in a low-income neighborhood in Ankara's Mamak district in the same way as one in a better-off area.

This system harms the autonomy of the teaching profession. Teachers were not even consulted.

Özgür Bozdoğan, educator