STUDYING IN GERMANY
Organized university education in Germany dates back to several centuries ago. The first university was in Heidelberg in the fourteenth century. Today, there are more than 300 institutions of higher learning all over Germany including 82 Universities, 132 other institutions offering shorter and more practically-orientated courses and 46 colleges of music and fine arts.
Germany is a great industrialized nation. To this end, it is ranked among the five largest economies in the world. Germany is open to foreign students who number thousands.
Germany has become even more attractive to foreign students, since there are now undergraduate and postgraduate courses in German universities that are internationally accredited, leading to Bachelor and Master degrees. Many of these courses are taught in English, including those in the fields of engineering, natural science and business studies.
Most universities are state institutions. There are no study fees at German universities. In addition, German universities are autonomous and centered on research and teaching. This has made statistics to show that thousands of foreign students have graduated from German institutions over the years thereby benefiting from the broad range of opportunities that German education system had to offer. Not only that, Germany has become attractive to foreign students because of these benefits:
- The German university system offers you an enormous freedom of choice for subjects and the kind of courses you want to enroll for. You can choose from an undergraduate courses studying towards a Bachelor degree just like in most countries of the world. One can also put in for the traditional German Magister or Diplom, which normally takes four years. Postgraduate courses include Masters or PhD’s or the German Doktorat.
- To make life easier for international students coming into the German Higher Education system, more and more of the degree courses – especially the BA and MA courses – are taught in English. The variety of subjects is vast, and the course structure offers you a great choice.
- Although in future (moderate) tuition fees will increasingly be introduced, in many cases studying in Germany, particularly for a first degree, is free of charge allowing the student the ability to plan his budget.
- What makes German higher education institutions so special is the combination of advanced research and teaching – not only in the areas they are well known for, such as sciences, mathematics and engineering but also business and economics, law, social sciences and the arts. Nearly all German university departments now interact closely with national and international academic bodies and research institutes, as well as business and industry.
By: OBAFEMI TORIOLA