Ukraine is supposedly moving closer to the European Union through an association agreement, but it is still far adrift of the standards required to meet European norms. Higher education reforms are needed to tackle everything from bribery to low academic quality and Ph.D. preparation.
Hopes of educational reform now rest on Ukraine signing an association and free-trade agreement with the EU during a summit in Vilnius, Lithuania, on Nov. 28. Additional, part of the agreement mentions reforms of higher education and the standards expected in the Bologna Process, agreements among European nations designed to ensure comparability in educational standards and quality.
New cooperation between Ukraine and the EU presupposes establishing international institutions that include representatives from civil society, with the decisions of such institutions having legal power. Therefore, we may soon see media discussions about the agreement going beyond political and economic issues.
The education community is still waiting for the pro-European rhetoric of Ukrainian state officers to convert into real actions. But Ukraine is a country of paradoxes – as are many unstable states with transitional economies and marginal political cultures.
The Ministry of Education and Science does not recognize structured Western-style Ph.D. programs. In Ukraine these only exist at the Kyiv Mohyla Academy so far. That is why our university decided to work in partnership with other universities to prepare Ph.D. students to defend their theses.
Ukraine has not implemented educational reforms in line with its Bologna obligations, instead sticking to the Soviet degree system. The ministry has invented new bureaucratic practices to convert the title of a post-Soviet candidate of science into a Ph.D. It has translated “diplomas” into English, merely changing the title without altering the methods of postgraduate education and integrating it into the European system.
Corruption, systemic problems
Corruption has distinctive features in post-Soviet states that infect the field of higher education.
The student movement is tackling some of them. On Sept. 14, the Ukrainian Association of Student Self-Government held a panel discussion in Kyiv titled “Student Vision of Legislative Reforms in Ukrainian Higher Education.” Numerous problems were mentioned, including bribery, the low quality of learning and teaching and the centralization of higher education administration, which makes it impossible for universities, students and employers to influence the educational process.
More work also needs to be done on admissions to Ukrainian universities. Maksym Opanasenko, a journalist for the Svidomo website, noted that in admission rules that higher education institutions will need to conform to next year, the independent online system Konkurs – competition – is not mentioned at all. Over the last two years, this system has enabled applicants to follow changes in the admissions rating of different universities during the admissions process. This significantly curbed corruption in admissions.
But bribery in Ukraine easily changes its colors.
Previously, bribes were mainly paid to get applicants enrolled at universities; now they are paid to ensure students stay there. Passing a test costs on average Hr 50 ($6) and the successful defense of coursework costs Hr 2,000 ($245).
The main factors causing bribery in higher education institutions are low salaries and the depreciation of Ukrainian diplomas in the eyes of employers, who now prefer to retrain university graduates so that they fit employer requirements. For students it does not matter how they get marks as it will not influence their future employment. Only their skills are important, but these skills are often obtained outside universities through informal educational systems and moonlighting.
What kind of reforms?
The current state of educational reform in Ukraine can be illustrated by a special page on the government website portal, with the promising title of “educational reforms.”
It contains information on two issues: pre-school education levels – here we can see progress from 73.3 percent in 2010 to 81 percent in 2012 – and the number of vehicles bought through the school bus program – 112 in 2010 and 900 in 2012. The buses take children living in the countryside to schools in neighboring villages. The website states that this reform was implemented with the aim of integrating Ukrainian education into the common European education area.
What more is there to say?
Serhiy Kvit has been rector of the National University of Kyiv Mohyla Academy since 2007. He founded the Kyiv Mohyla School of Journalism in 2001 and became president of the Media Reform Centre set up to initiate open debate and promote more transparent media and government. This is an edited version of his column published by University World News http://www.universityworldnews.com/topic.php?topic=WorldRoundup. It is reprinted with the author’s permission.
