Most students pay their tuition from their own pockets

Most students pay their tuition fees from personal incomes. Stipends and financial aid are offered to only 21.8% of students. According to data from the National Bureau of Statistics, in the 2007/2008 academic year the percentage of students paying their tuition is 77.7%, while 0.5% of students find funds from alternative sources, Info-Prim Neo reports. The minimum yearly tuition fee is 2100 MDL for day courses and 800 MDL for correspondence courses, and the maximum fee varies between 13600 and 5600 MDL, depending on the specialty and institution. In the 2007/2008 academic year, 23.8 thousand persons were matriculated in universities, by 8.1% more than last year. The most popular are state universities, where the number of applications was 278 per 100 persons matriculated, while in private institutions the number of applications was 161 per 100 entrants. As concerns the education level of the applicants, 61% are graduates of high-schools, approximately one quarter – graduates of pre-higher schools, 11.9% continued studies after graduating colleges and 0.8% after graduating professional and vocational schools. The share of students enrolled based on their bachelors exam is 65.8%, compared to 60.9% from the 2006-2007 study year. This year 21.3% of the enrolled students opted for educational sciences; 6.3% humanitarian arts; 31.0% for social sciences, economics and law; 5.8% for exact sciences; 24.2% for engineering, architecture and construction, 2.8% for agriculture, 3.8% for medicine, 4.8% for service-related studies. There are 31 higher education institutions, of which 17 are state-owned and 14 are private. The overall number of students is 122.9 thousand, a 4.0% decrease compared to 2006/07 academic year.