Austria is the only EU country where anyone can go to university, regardless of their qualifications. Now that the EU has ruled foreign students can study in Austria under the same conditions, universities are experiencing a massive influx of students, writes Nora S. Stampfl from café babel.
Abstract:
On July 7 2005, the European Court of Justice ruled that the Austrian requirement for foreign students to be registered at university in their native country was against EU equal opportunities legislation. Since then, there has been a state of emergency in Austrian universities, which have been overrun with low-achieving students from Germany. The situation is particularly dramatic in the medical faculties: in Vienna 1,500 Austrians compete with as many German applicants for only 1,560 places; in Innsbruck 447 Austrians come up against 2,147 Germans for only 500 places; and in Graz there are only 300 places for 917 Austrian and 1,964 Germans.
Emergency Situation
The Austrian government has answered the stampede at the universities with a short-term emergency law which states that the autonomous universities have a free hand with the rules of entry limits in eight subjects: Human Medicine, Dentistry, Veterinary Medicine, Psychology, Biology, Pharmacy, Business Studies and Journalism. Education Minister Elisabeth Gehrer explains that “a country of 8 million inhabitants cannot provide student places for a country of 80 million people”. They are trying, with the use of defensive tactics and time-tested tricks, to make sure that the native students get priority over foreign students.
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