State institution of higher learning

State institution of higher learning [державний вищий навчальний заклад; derzhavnyi vyshchyi navchalnyi zaklad]. The status of a ‘state’ institution is accorded to universities, academies, and colleges that are funded by the state and offer free education or a combination of free and fee-paying education. State institutions of higher learning include those with a third and fourth levels of accreditation: colleges and universities (or academies) respectively. The designation of a ‘state’ university or institute began to be widely used after 1933, when classical universities were restored in Soviet Ukraine. In Soviet times all institutions of higher learning were state-funded, but only classical universities (ten by 1991) bore the word ‘state’ in their official names. Since 1994 more than a hundred of state universities and academies have been granted a more prestigeous status of a national institution of higher learning. ‘State’ universities and colleges continue to exist along with the national and private ones.

Serhiy Bilenky

[This article was written in 2020.]