According to Anna Wdowinska of the Perspektywy Education Foundation, during the 2017/18 academic year 37,829 Ukrainian students studied at Polish universities, representing more than 50% of the country’s international students.
There are a growing number of courses taught in English at Polish universities, meaning even greater international reach. In Lublin alone, there are already over 50 courses in English.
Studying in Poland requires significant investment. Ukrainians have to pay for tuition, with fees of up to €2,000 per year, although many universities offer discounts.
The growth of Poland’s Ukrainian student population predates the post-2014 surge in the country’s Ukrainian community and goes back to 2006, when the “Study in Poland” program first recognized Ukraine as a priority country. This program, implemented jointly by the Perspektywy Education Foundation and the Conference of Rectors of Academic Schools in Poland, has clearly produced results.
Recent research conducted by the Institute of Public Affairs, together with CEDOS, the Slovak Foreign Policy Association and the Central European University, provides the most comprehensive picture of Poland’s Ukrainian population. Based on interviews with 1,055 Ukrainians studying in Poland, the survey found that the most frequently chosen subjects were journalism, international relations, administration and law. Half of Ukrainian students consider themselves fluent in Polish. Some 70% of respondents rated the attitudes of Poles towards them as good or very good, while 80% expressed satisfaction with their studies in Poland. Two-thirds of Ukrainian students have part-time work alongside their studies, despite the fact that parents pay tuition fees in most cases.
Geographically speaking, the largest concentrations of Ukrainian students during the 2017/18 academic year were in the Warsaw and Mazovia regions (9,913 students), Krakow and Lesser Poland (5,530), Lublin (4,344), Wroclaw and Lower Silesia (3,446) and Lodz (3,079). In the Lower Silesia and Lodz regions, the number of students from Ukraine increased last year by about 18% and 17% respectively.
Ukrainian students are making their mark academically in Poland and regularly feature in the country’s annual Interstudent Awards. Organized by the Perspektywy Education Foundation, this event aims to identify the top international students in Poland. In eight years of competition’s history, Ukrainians have featured among the finalists virtually every single year.NIKE
