counter-intuitive business sense

[cimorene]

you'd think that since finland is the last country in the eu with free higher education, even for exchange students and foreign students, they would want to keep it relatively quiet, or even discourage people from coming, wouldn't you? i figured that was why it was so low-publicity, when i was going through the application process. which is admittedly a drag. i understand it may not remain free, that it's come up for discussion, but there hasn't been much noise about it so it can't be anytime soon. and meanwhile it turned out i was wrong.

my university is in the strange position of looking for new ways to advertise itself internationally, even though more students in theory should just stretch its somewhat limited resources. (thinking about the university as run on a somewhat iffy budget and public funds helps to understand the differences which make it hard to deal with in certain ways.) in fact, their advertising is so limp and ineffective that i didn't realise they were at all until, well, today. it makes sense now, since a few weeks ago a family friend enlightened me that their funding is a function of the number of students they graduate. they are not an organ of the government, meanwhile, but a private university - so they have every reason to want more international students (and to make it more efficient and easy for people to graduate, but let's not get too hasty) and none in particular to discourage them.

Comments

[anatsuno.livejournal.com]

anything you think I could come and study there? I don't speak swedish of finnish... i have a bachelor's in cinema from the nineties and will get a masters in literary translation from english to french next september normally... *ponders up northern things*

[cimness.livejournal.com]

ahhaha, but why would you want to if you already have a degree? there's a limited number of hours one can work on a student visa, besides which it's hard to find employment if you don't speak finnish, and to get the student visa in the first place you have to prove you have enough money to support yourself for the year, that is, a finnish bank account in your name with enough money in it, in principle, something like €6000 for a year. (these difficulties are probably why there aren't more international students.)

although, possibly because of the international orientation of the university (and the abovementioned factors about their budget!), you don't have to speak swedish already to get in - they'll teach it to you. (this is what i did, although they seem to have changed the requirements and you can't get into my degree program without knowing swedish already anymore!)

Some degree programmes do not require knowledge of Swedish as a requirement for entry although the language of instruction in the programmes is Swedish. Applicants to these programmes with little or no knowledge of Swedish must prove their knowledge of English when applying to these programmes.

These degree programmes are:
• Faculty of Arts
- all degree programmes, please also note the following regarding the language subjects:
- degree programme in German Philology: knowledge of German is required
- degree programme in Romance Philology: knowledge of French is required
- degree programme in Finnish Language and Literature: knowledge of Finnish is required
- degree programme in Russian Language and Literature: knowledge of Russian is required
• Faculty of Mathematics and Natural Sciences
- all degree programmes
• Faculty of Technology
- all degree programmes
- when a Master's degree programme in English is offered in the subject, applicants without knowledge of Swedish are primarily referred to that programme

i've also found that, even though i am competent in swedish, professors tend to be amenable to having papers and exams written in english - some have offered. this seems kind of on crack, but in fact, it does seem to be possible, with a year's instruction in swedish and some hard studying, to get good enough to follow swedish lectures the next year.

[buddleia.livejournal.com]

We have whole departments devoted to international recruitment. But we most certainly do charge, and least 33% of our engineering student body is overseas, that is non-EU or UK.