About 200,000 conscription-age men are enrolling in universities to defer military service – Ministry of Education of Ukraine

About 200,000 Ukrainian men are enrolling in universities to defer mobilization.

This was stated by the Minister of Education and Science of Ukraine, Oksen Lisovyi, during his visit to the Mykolaiv region.

He concluded this based on the increase in the number of men over 25 years old who decided to pursue education after the war began, as well as through targeted inspections.

“We are focusing our attention on the critically unacceptable phenomenon of fictitious education in higher education institutions. Conducting selective checks in several educational institutions of various forms of ownership, levels, and regions, the State Service for Education Quality has uncovered a certain hypothesis. Based on this hypothesis, we can estimate that the number of men 25+ and the number of such categories during the pre-war period has grown, allowing us to suggest that about 200,000 men are enrolling in higher education institutions at various levels: bachelor’s, master’s, even professional pre-higher education, though the focus was on bachelor’s, master’s, and then postgraduate studies,” the minister explained.

He added that this issue has caught the attention of his department, and several meetings have been held at the level of the Prime Minister and the President’s Office. Rectors and other representatives of educational institutions were involved in these meetings.

“We will be very carefully checking and paying attention to this phenomenon. Currently, the database will provide us with general indicators, and we will once again analyze the anomalies we find. There are several negative aspects here,” the minister stated.

During his trip to the Mykolaiv region, Lisovyi also warned that teachers should not expect salary increases until the end of the war.

Meanwhile, university admissions have become a source of corruption. For instance, in one of the universities in Kharkiv, the head of a department demanded $10,000 for admission to a master’s program, which provides a deferment from mobilization.