Foreigners call education in Ukrainian universities the analogue of “cheap Harvard” and massively go to Kiev, Kharkov, Odessa and Lugansk. In the domestic institutions of higher education the number of foreign students is growing rapidly. They come to Ukraine for the European, in their opinion, education. Students believe that the Kyiv Shevchenko University provides education not worse than the famous Harvard, besides the cost is much cheaper. So, they will have to pay seven times more for the education in American universities.

Most of them are from Azerbaijan (12.7 thousand), Turkmenistan (5.8 thousand) and China (four thousand) Also you can often meet students from Nigeria, India, Iraq, Russia, Jordan, Morocco and Turkey. A lot of foreigners began to go to Ukraine to get education after the introduction of the Bologna system of education. Asians and Africans consider that the Ukrainian education system is the European one. They often want to receive diplomas of medical and technical universities. These specialties are in great demand abroad. Fewer people are going to study to Russia, because of frequent racial conflicts.

Low tuition fees attract more and more foreign students to the regional centers of Ukraine. For example, Kharkov has quadrupled the number of foreign students for the years of independence of the country – from 5 thousand to 20 thousand. There is a growing number of them in Odessa, Lviv and Luhansk.

In Kiev, in Soviet times, there were about 7,5 thousand foreign visitors, and today – about 9 thousand people. The administration of the Ukrainian universities is trying to keep the brand of “cheap Harvard” and offer their students new services. In particular, it is the English language training.