Is the Unified State Exam (USE) a good or bad thing?

I honestly don't know. Taking the USE is good because you get into institutes based on the points earned, and it saves you from unnecessary stress. On the other hand, some exams, like literature, are better taken in the traditional form. The math exam is designed so that those studying for a 3 or a 4 will pass without any problems, but someone aiming for a 5 might actually fail. Then again, that's what makes it a five. And as for the Russian tests... one of us scored 55 points, even though he's completely clueless in Russian and wrote his dictations for a 3 bordering on a 2. Meanwhile, three people from our class were just one point short of a 5—now that's frustrating! And they also say there's strict discipline! That depends on where you end up. In my room, you couldn't even turn around, but in the next one, the answer sheets were flying all over the room, people were solving problems for each other and letting others cheat. Identical versions of the test sometimes appear in the same rooms too. That works in our favor, but from an organizational standpoint, these USE exams are far from perfect; they still need a lot of work.