THE CZECH REPUBLIC – ATTRACTIVE COUNTRY FOR STUDY Foreign cooperation programmes, such as ERASMUS and CEEPUS, are some of the best-known ways for foreign students to obtain admission to Czech universities. This, however, is not the only opportunity for Czech university students to meet their foreign mates on university grounds. The Czech Republic has become a much sought-after educational centre in recent years.
The following is a review of the current situation in which foreign university students studying in the Czech Republic find themselves. The review is based on a survey carried out by the Foreign Cooperation House in conjunction with the Ministry of Education, Youth and Physical Culture, and Czech universities at the turn of the year 2019/2020.
FOREIGN STUDENTS IN THE CZECH REPUBLIC
LARGEST CZECH UNIVERSITIES ARE MOST ATTRACTIVE Which universities and which courses of study are most popular? Unequivocally in the lead are the largest Czech universities, where the most popular field of study is Medicine, followed by Economic Studies, Natural Sciences, ICT and technical fields. For nearly half of the foreign students, the main reason for coming to study in the Czech Republic is a specific field of study or a specific university. For one-third of them a role is played by the geographical position of this country in the centre of Europe, which enables them to travel easily across the entire European continent. For one-quarter of the respondents, the decisive fac-
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The enrolment of foreign students at Czech universities at the beginning of 2020 was 46 534, which is 16 % of the total number of university students studying in Czech educational institutions. Over the past 9 years, those students have been supplementing the continuously declining number of Czech university students. The number of foreign students is increasing year on year (the increase since 2011 is 6.2 percentage points). Nearly half (45 %) of foreign students come from Slovakia, proving the close relationship between the two nations, which for more
than half a century constituted one country. The second largest group (27 %) are students from the territory of the former Soviet Union (Russia, Ukraine, Kazakhstan, and Belarus), followed by students from India, Germany, China, and other European and non-European countries.
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The Czech Republic – Your Business Partner in the EU
