Turkish middle school, high school, and university exams are very serious.
Basically everyone takes the same set of long exams (with a few additions you can add to your standard exam sets, for specialized schools) and when the results come out, you are compared to all other students in the nation.
Like, think global leaderboards.
The best universities will outright reject you if your ranking isn't high enough.
It's very intense and cut-throat; so much so that - when I was a young'un growing up in Turkey - I just opted to try my hand at the SATs instead. Ended up going to school abroad.
The SATs were so easy, compared to the exam prep we did in our Turkish classes, it almost felt like a joke. Though, college tuition costs definitely made sure I wasn't the one with the last laugh.
Can we not give them ideas? Thanks.