What attracts foreigners to Ukrainian universities?
Walking into one of the biggest and most prestigious schools of higher learning in Luhansk, I was unpleasantly surprised to see dimly lit corridors. Although there were many light bulbs hanging from the ceiling, only one in every four was working. This created an unpleasant, murky atmosphere in this temple of learning that recently upgraded its status from institute to university, following the fashion of the times. “I could hardly find your office: even the doorplates are hard to see,” I complained to the rector. His reply took me by surprise, as I expected him to shift the blame to some work-shy electricians. But no, the problem is the university’s tight finances. This I find hard to believe, since in recent years universities have been run on a solid commercial footing, with rather high tuition fees, to put it mildly. Yet they still can’t afford light bulbs.
On the bright side, the range of vocational training opportunities is growing, with more and more schools offering courses that are completely unrelated to their primary educational purpose. It’s no longer surprising to graduate as a hairdresser or makeup artist from a pedagogical college or as a journalist from an agricultural college. As they say, for money you can satisfy any whim. Another source for improving the material well-being of universities, and therefore their educational capacities, is the steadily increasing tuition fees.
However, much as the university administrations try to attract the greatest possible number of paying students to their lecture halls, there are strictly defined limits on such commercialization. The ratio of government sponsored students and paying students may not exceed 100:50. But these restrictions do not apply to foreign students, and universities can enroll as many foreigners as they can handle. Of course, foreigners can’t expect financial aid from our government and therefore they pay for their studies.
According to Luhansk Medical University Rector Valery Ivchenko, “The influx of foreign students began to dry up seven or eight years ago. Foreigners have been obtaining a medical education at our university since 1983. Whereas earlier we taught many Latin Americans, Arabs, and Africans and issued diplomas to hundreds of foreign graduates every year, last year we had the last big graduating class of foreign doctors. In 2004 only sixteen foreigners will graduate from our university. There was even a time when the governments of some countries advised their citizens against studying in Ukraine. This was a major problem for us.” In the next couple of years there will be almost no foreign graduates until it is graduation time for those who enrolled this year and last. “But we seem to have passed the critical stage in the enrollment of foreign students. We have signed contracts with some companies in India and Malaysia, which are recruiting students for our university in their countries. To facilitate this, we made a fundamental revision of the educational benefits of our university in a market where supply exceeds demand today,” says Foreign Students’ Faculty Dean Yury Pustovoy.
Two years ago Luhansk Medical University, drawing on the experience of several similar educational institutions in Ukraine, decided to offer foreigners the possibility of selecting courses taught in English, and this trend was adopted for the first time in 2002. Meanwhile, this successful marketing solution has many opponents. Are foreigners in other countries taught in the language of their choice? Do Ukrainians obtain an education in Ukrainian or Russian in universities in the US, England, or France? Now that you are here, kindly learn our language before obtaining an education. To this Yury Pustovoy replies: “First, we are no Sorbonne or Oxford; we must soberly evaluate the benefits of our university in the educational services market. It depends on a number of legitimate factors. For foreign students to want to study in our schools, maximally convenient conditions must be created for them, such as the possibility of taking courses in English for a relatively moderate price, compared to prices elsewhere in the world. We must be realistic: had we not introduced courses in English, we would have had to content ourselves with thirty Arab students a year at best.” The benefits for students are obvious. They don’t have to take preparatory courses to study Russian. Most importantly, back home they will find it a lot easier to pass tests to validate their diplomas, since they will know all the medical terms in the language of their country.
“We find it very convenient to study in English but also to know Russian,” says Rovindran Subramaniam, expressing the unanimous opinion of a group of Malaysian students. It’s true that they had time to complete a preparatory course in Simferopol before continuing their education in Luhansk. “To become a doctor in India, you must pay an average of $40,000 for a five-year program. Here, of course, it is much cheaper. We will necessarily learn Russian. We understand that we can’t do without it,” the students say.
“As a rule, foreigners are very eager to learn Russian and take an interest in our life, history, and customs. I won’t say that language comes easy to them; some have a very hard time learning it. But gradually they all learn to speak,” says Olena Bernal-Nelovkina, who teaches at the Ukrainian Studies Faculty.
What about lecturers? There’s no need to explain how “enthusiastic” most Ukrainian students are about studying foreign languages. Many can’t string foreign words together even after five years of studies. How could they find so many teachers in a medical university to lecture and conduct practical classes in English? What is most surprising is that every faculty has one or two such teachers. “What makes you think it’s a problem?” Yury Pustovoy asks, surprised. “We had more than enough volunteers to take courses, master the language, and teach in English. We held a special competition to select the best. Now seventy of our teachers are taking courses to master English by the time students begin studying in their specialized medical disciplines. Here motivation is important — after all, an English- speaking teacher immediately qualifies for a number of benefits, such as doubled salaries. But most importantly, such a specialist has an edge when the university signs new contracts with the teaching staff.”
Without a doubt, the possibility of studying in one’s mother tongue or a familiar language is not the only consideration of foreign students who are choosing a university. For example, Arabs study in Russian only and will continue to do so, since their governments recognize only those diplomas that students earned studying in the language of the host country. Incidentally, this year fifty Syrians will enroll at Luhansk Medical University, and their government will pay their tuition fees. Rector Valery Ivchenko recently returned from Syria: “Syria has remained the sixteenth republic of the USSR. Medical and education services are free there, including those obtained abroad. So they will gladly come to us.”
All the foreigners that I spoke with said that they like studying in Luhansk. It is inexpensive and quiet; they get a lot of attention, and there are no racially motivated conflicts. Indian student Suprotim Hosh said, “My brother studies in St. Petersburg. He says it’s very dangerous there. Many young people have an aggressive attitude toward dark-skinned foreigners. They insult you or beat you up in broad daylight. Neither streets, nor the subway or campuses are safe. Everything is different here.”
Without a doubt, in the near future graduates in prosperous European countries will hardly opt for provincial Ukrainian universities even if they have an excellent scholarly and educational reputation. Our living standards, services, and recreational opportunities do not meet their demands. But even among those foreigners who come to study here there are few really bright ones. Still there is reason to be optimistic. “Until recently we accepted every applicant. But lately we have noticed that the level of training and educational motivations of foreign students have increased significantly. We are planning to select students based on how they score on tests at home. We will also increase the number of foreigners to 300 every year,” says Yury Pustovoy.
The desire to teach foreign students is quite understandable. No one is hiding the fact that they want to profit from educational services. But what should be done about the obviously declining popularity of medical education with both Ukrainian and foreign graduates? Rector Ivchenko views this problem with a great deal of pessimism: “The medical profession is becoming less and less popular in our country. Doctors’ wages remain outrageously low, whereas medical studies are difficult, lengthy, and require considerable effort. If things go on like this for much longer, we’ll have no one to treat us.” But that’s a different story.
