By Valeriya Antonova, RUDN University
Russia awards 15,000 scholarships to foreign students annually. These individuals will have the chance to receive free training and regular benefits. In 2017, a total of 243,000 international students pursued an education in Russia. This figure is expected to increase beyond 700,000 by 2025. There were more than 96,000 applications for the scholarships in 2017/18; however, priority will typically be given to winners of Olympiads and to students with excellent school grades.
As a guideline, students will have to keep in mind that some higher education programmes are more popular than the others. Students may have a higher chance of receiving grants for majors such as “Philosophy”, “Mathematics” and “Chemistry” in comparison to “International journalism”, “IT” and “Pharmacy”. Therefore, students can estimate their chances of receiving a grant based on facts like trends in countries of origin and statistics on the popularity of various programmes.
As of 2015, there were 183,100 foreign students in Russia, 45,201 of which came from 26 Asian countries. The TOP-5 States of Asia with large student representations include China, India, Vietnam, Malaysia and South Korea.
In addition, out of the 8000 students who studied at RUDN University, approximately 30 percent are international students; thereby reflecting the university’s international standing and its ability to meet the demands of these international students through various programmes. As of 2016, there were students from a total of 154 countries, of which the TOP-5 include China, Vietnam, Syria, Namibia and South African Republic. In 2017, the total number of international students increased to 9,000; of which include 22 Asia countries among 155 countries of student origin with the TOP-5 leading countries being China, Iran, Vietnam, Afghanistan and South African Republic.
The RUDN University’s strategy is aimed at diversifying the geography of admissions; therefore, the university has implemented a set of measures to achieve this objective. In addition, experts have shared that the most popular programmes among international students in Russia relate to majors like “Medicine”, “Economy” and “Humanities”. In the case of RUDN, the TOP-10 programmes chosen by international students for the year of 2016 and 2017 include:
| 2016 | 2017 |
| Medicine, | Medicine, |
| Law, | Dentistry, |
| Dentistry, | Philology, |
| Linguistics, | International Relations, |
| International Relations, | Linguistics, |
| Philology, | Economics, |
| Economics, | Law, |
| Construction, | Management, |
| Oil and Gas Engineering, | Oil and Gas Engineering, |
| Pharmacy. | Pharmacy. |
However, these are the only 10 out of 472 higher education programs being taught at RUDN University. This means that the chances of obtaining a grant for other programmes are higher than those most popular ones. In addition, when choosing future careers, students will have to carefully assess their strengths, educational trends and prospects of a labor market.
What will be the TOP-10 in 2018? Depends on you!
Join us in the upcoming QS WORLDWIDE 2018 from 22-23 May 2018 in Moscow, Russia, as we discuss the topic on “In Search of University Excellence: Perspectives from Russia and Emerging Countries”