You're reading: Buying grades, diplomas persists in Ukraine’s universities, colleges

Students of Kyiv’s National Dragomanov University have a social media account through which they can ask questions about the university, anonymously if they want.

Usually the questions are about organizational issues, although sometimes there are complaints about staff, grades or the quality of lectures, according to Vlad Melnyk, one of the university’s student activists.

“But we recently got this question: ‘Why did the price of a ‘bigunok’ go up?’” Melnyk said, referring to an appointment card needed by students who are re-taking exams. “It’s supposed to be free.”
He discovered that students at the university’s Child Development Institute had to pay the director to sign their appointment cards. First the price was Hr 50, but it rose to Hr 70, Melnyk said, with some students needing five to seven such cards signed.

Cases like this are still not unusual.

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According to a recent poll by the Democratic Initiatives Foundation, published in June, 34 percent of students said that they had encountered corruption while studying. Another 26 percent said they heard about cases of corruption from fellow students.

That means that the situation has not improved in four years, the foundation says. A similar study in 2011 found that 33 percent of students said they had faced corruption, and 29 percent had heard about it from their peers.

The real numbers might be even higher, said Yegor Stadny, executive director of CEDOS, a think tank on educational issues. Low-quality education fuels the problem, he said.

Reading “between the lines,” Stadny said it appears that 34 percent of the nation’s students are opting to pay for their grades and, ultimately, diplomas.

According to Stadny, in most cases corruption is initiated by underperforming students, not by teachers. “There are almost no teachers who would extort a bribe from a student who is able to pass an exam on their own,” he said.

Education Minister Serhiy Kvit has said that students’ acceptance of graft as well as the difficult economy are reasons for the ongoing corruption.

Education Minister Serhiy Kvit

Fostering competition among Ukrainian universities and building modern ones that can compete internationally are part of the solution, Kvit said.

Meanwhile, student activist Melnyk was discovering that problems ran even deeper at Dragomanov’s Child Development Institute.

The institute’s director, Iryna Zaharnytska, allegedly demanded that students who receive financial aid from the university pay a kickback to the dean’s office. According to Melnyk: “Students received either Hr 460 or Hr 840 – mostly Hr 840. They were told at first to return Hr 200 to the dean’s office…Then they were told to return Hr 400, and then Hr 640.”

After Melnyk and other students called for Zaharnytska’s dismissal, a working group of teachers and students was created. The group recommended that the university president replace the institute’s director. “She wasn’t dismissed, but she didn’t stay. Officially she took a sabbatical,” Melnyk said.
Zaharnytska in a Facebook post denied the allegations, calling them “harassment.” She didn’t respond to requests for comments from the Kyiv Post.

Gregory Torbin, the vice rector of Dragomanov University who headed the working group, said it was impossible to verify the students’ allegations.

Melnyk, however, says student activists are gathering evidence and consulting a lawyer.

This is not the first case of allegedly “rotten rectors.” A court in Irpin, a city in Kyiv Oblast, on July 9 acquitted Petro Melnyk, the former president of a local university that trains future tax collectors. He was arrested on July 27, 2013 after he was allegedly caught taking a bribe of Hr 120,000 for enrolling two students. Melnyk has always maintained his innocence.

Kvit says a new law would prevent anyone subject to the law on lustration or with a criminal record from becomiing a rector. Kvit is also lobbying for a new law on higher education that, according to CEDOS think tank’s Stadny, will grant universities more freedom and responsibility. The law is meant to make it easier to attract high-quality students who really want to learn.

According to Kvit, implementing the new law will require involvement from the academic community, students and administrators.

“Everyone has to be demanding of everyone else, and this mutual oversight will step by step change the perception of the academic community,” Kvit said. “We will be successful, but it will take time.”

Kyiv Post staff writer Alyona Zhuk can be reached at [email protected].