The Ministry of Education and Science of Ukraine has updated the licensing volumes of educational activities at the bachelor’s level for 195 higher education institutions of state, municipal and private ownership. The relevant order No. 30-l was adopted as part of the licensing policy update, which does not affect the availability of higher education for applicants, but aims to equalise the declared and actual capacity of universities.
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The Ministry of Education and Science notes that many institutions do not use even half of the places allowed by their licences each year. An analysis of data in recent years has shown that some higher education institutions do not enrol in certain study programmes at all, or the number of students is significantly lower than the approved number. These are mainly branches that do not conduct enrolment, some relocated universities, and some private educational institutions.
According to Mykhailo Vynnytskyi, Deputy Minister of Education and Science of Ukraine, such ‘inflated’ licences discredit the system and contradict the principle of unlimited licensing, which requires compliance with real human, material and organisational capacities. For example, if an institution has a licence for 2700 places but only accepts 400 students, this raises doubts about the transparency of the educational process.
The reduction of the licence volume applies not only to bachelor’s but also to master’s and doctoral programmes, as well as to specialities that are subject to state regulation. The reason for such decisions was the use of less than 50% of the licence volume in recent years: four for bachelor’s degree programmes, six for medical master’s degree programmes, and two for other master’s degree programmes.
The Ministry also notes that the update of the volumes does not affect the jobs of teachers in any way — they are formed in accordance with the actual number of students, not the limits prescribed in the licence.
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