ENTRY IN AUSTRIAN UNIVERSITIES IN 2020, AND WHAT SPECIALTY TO CHOOSE

2020 has turned the lives of many people upside down. Pandemic COVID-19, total uncertainty and uncertainty. And if earlier there was an acute question of what specialty to choose so that it would be in demand in 5 years, now ... Now, many applicants do not understand anything at all: neither what specialty to choose, nor how to enter Austrian universities at all, when the borders are closed, quarantine is everywhere , isolation and total lockdown. A lot of questions come up, so I decided to write this article and answer most of the most relevant ones.

Can I apply during quarantine?

Austria is one of the first countries in Europe to introduce quarantine, and is now gradually emerging from it. So, since May 1, restrictions on movement have been lifted, you can gather in groups of up to 10 people. The rule of social distance (at least 1 m) and wearing masks in public places remain unchanged.

Further, since May 2, hairdressers, beauty salons, hardware stores with an area of ​​over 400 sq.m. have resumed their work. On May 4, high school students and graduates returned to schools. Restaurants, wine buschenshanks, and zoos have opened since May 15. From May 18, pupils of the junior and middle grades went to schools. From May 29, hotels, boarding houses, outdoor swimming pools will open, and from June 3, students of technical schools and vocational schools will start their studies.

While the rules are valid until June 30. There is no exact information on students yet. It is known that a number of entrance tests for medicine were postponed from July to autumn (there is also no exact date yet).

Unlike the CIS countries, admission and admission to Austrian universities occurs twice a year: in the autumn and summer semesters.

This means that even if you cannot apply for the fall (for example, for a university in Graz, documents for the fall semester are submitted before September 5), then they can be submitted for the summer semester and arrive by March 1, without losing a whole year.

Another question is how to apply, take exams, enroll and generally come to Austria during a pandemic. Of course, there are difficulties here, but there are also options for solutions. It is easier to break them down into several points.

1. Submission of documents

Despite the state of emergency, the submission of documents to Austrian universities has not been canceled. At the same time, each Austrian university has its own autonomy, and therefore different universities determine their own rules for filing documents and admission. So, for example, you can submit documents to the University of Vienna online for several years. Here registration is mandatory, and its terms are strictly limited, and for each specialty they are different. All this takes place on the Uspace university platform. During the pandemic, the university relaxed documents and apostilles, allowing them to be “delivered” later. But the enrollment order will be issued, respectively, later.

At the University of Graz, however, the approach is more conservative. You can submit documents either in person or by mail. Registration is required only for those specialties for which an entrance test has been introduced. As I said above, documents submitted before September 5 are considered as for the fall semester, and documents submitted after September 5 are considered for the summer semester. For applicants from the CIS countries, this means that even if obtaining certificates of secondary education is delayed and the deadlines are shifted, this will not particularly affect the submission of documents to Austrian universities. If only because, usually, and without a state of emergency, only half of the children had time for the fall semester, which begins on October 1,. The rest arrived by March 1, i.e. for the summer semester. The fact that studies can be started twice a year is an indisputable plus.

Well, of course, in order to enter the preparatory course, you must not only submit documents, but also have a German level of at least A2. If the level is lower than C1, the university will issue a conditional admission order and send it to preparatory courses. Learn more about document requirements in this article.

2. Arrival in Austria

Documents are documents, but the actual question remains: how to come to Austria when the borders are closed? On May 11, an official answer to this question appeared on the website of the University of Graz.

Students who study at the University of Graz (and receiving a conditional admission order equates you to such), but live abroad, can apply for an official certificate, the so-called. a certificate of a suburban resident or a pendulum migrant - "Pendlerbescheinigung", in order to be able to come to the city of study (pendler (German) - a person who travels to another city to study or work).

The certificate form can be downloaded from the website of the Austrian Chamber of Commerce. Further, the completed form must be sent by e-mail to the address of the university in the student department. After that, the student receives a certificate from the University of Graz with an electronic signature.

Simply put, the admission algorithm at the moment is as follows.

Documents (application for admission) can be submitted online (to the University of Vienna and some universities of applied sciences) or by mail (universities of Graz and other cities in Austria).

The university enrolls the applicant conditionally with the opportunity to attend preparatory courses (if the level of German is below C1).

On the basis of the order, the student receives a residence permit, and he can enter the country with Pendlerbescheinigungen. The borders within the EU are already beginning to open, and you can enter the country by land transport right now. Air traffic should be resumed soon.

I really want to believe that by the fall (the beginning of classes, as I said, from October 1), the borders with non-EU countries will also open. By the way, students of Austrian universities who left for their countries during quarantine can also use the certificate of a pendulum resident.