The Ukrainian Defense Ministry has reassured worried parents that high-school students graduating a month earlier this year, due to preparations for the Euro-2012 football championship, will not be drafted straight into the military and will not be hindered from going to university in 2012.
“The graduation from high-schools a month earlier, in May 2012 [which is normally in June], does not mean that fresh graduates will be drafted into the military and lose the chance to enroll into higher education,” Defense Minister Dmitry Salamatin said on Thursday.
The graduation in May falls within the limits of the spring military draft, which is held in April-May.
Ukraine decided to hold graduation events in all its educational institutions in May, rather than in June as is customary, as part of preparations for the Euro-2012 football championship, which will be held in Ukraine and Poland from June 8 until July 1.
Many parents of future high-school graduates expressed concern over the possibility that their children would be recruited for the 18 month military service and, therefore, deprived of the opportunity to enroll in higher education institutions immediately after graduation from high-schools.
