National Testing Service - Pakistan (NTS) is a

nonprofit A nonprofit organization (NPO), also known as a nonbusiness entity, nonprofit institution, not-for-profit organization, or simply a nonprofit, is a non-governmental (private) legal entity organized and operated for a collective, public, or so ...

organization in

Pakistan Pakistan, officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by population, fifth-most populous country, with a population of over 241.5 million, having the Islam by country# ...

that administers academic performance evaluation tests. It is a member of the International Association for Educational Assessment and the Higher Education Commission. NTS offers two main types of tests, the National Aptitude Test (NAT) and the Graduate Assessment Test (GAT). NTS was formed to ensure quality educational standards in Pakistan and to "provide a national scale for comparative grading between institutes", consolidating examination boards under one administrating body. Tests implemented prior to the development of the NTS were criticized as not accommodating socio-cultural differences, resulting in a need for "an indigenous testing service that should design and develop testing materials within an indigenous context".

History

Controversy erupted in 2007 following the mandating of NTS testing, first announced by Governor of

Punjab Punjab (; ; also romanised as Panjāb or Panj-Āb) is a geopolitical, cultural, and historical region in South Asia. It is located in the northwestern part of the Indian subcontinent, comprising areas of modern-day eastern Pakistan and no ...

, with regards to admission to universities and later set aside by the government unless the laws regarding university admission were amended. Criticism included allegations that the services were inconvenient to access and prohibitively expensive to economically challenged students. Maqbool called for input from the vice-chancellors of Punjab's public universities on 4 June. That year, each university department was permitted to set its own entrance requirements, with six of 64 departments at

Punjab University Punjab University may refer to: India * Punjab Agricultural University, a state agricultural university in Ludhiana, Punjab * I. K. Gujral Punjab Technical University, a state university in Kapurthala, Punjab * Maharaja Ranjit Singh Punjab Techn ...

electing to utilize tests from NTS. In October 2007, the

vice-chancellor A vice-chancellor (commonly called a VC) serves as the chief executive of a university in the United Kingdom, New Zealand, Australia, Nepal, India, Bangladesh, Malaysia, Nigeria, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, South Africa, Kenya, other Commonwealth of Nati ...

of Punjab University, Muhammad Arif Butt, endorsed the use of NTS testing in all departments of the university. NTS director Haroon Rasheed said that no tuition centres are associated with the service and NTS exams will not be out of course.

Legal education

In 2016 the

Pakistan Bar Council The Pakistan Bar Council (PBC) () was established by the National Assembly of Pakistan, Parliament in 1973 under the Legal Practitioners and Bar Councils Act. It is the highest elected body of lawyers in Pakistan. It has twenty two members el ...

amended the Legal Practitioners and Bar Councils Rules 1976 pertaining to admission of new advocates to the provincial Bar Councils. The new rules required applicants to sit and pass the Law Graduate Assessment Test (Law GAT) conducted by National Testing Service.

References

External links

* {{Education in Pakistan 2006 establishments in Pakistan Educational testing and assessment organizations Standardised tests in Pakistan Educational organisations based in Pakistan