Types of Higher Education Institutions in Greece

The Greek Higher education system comprise two sectors:
  • The University, which includes the Fine Arts, Polytechnics and the Universities.
  • The Technological, and it includes School of Pedagogic, TEIs and Technological Education.
Greece is always known for its binary system of Higher Education which is designed to ensure maximum flexibility and to respond to the wide variety of economic and social requirements.

The Greek Institutes for Higher Education Institutes are self-governing and runs under the public law, subsidized and supervised through the Ministry of Religious Affairs and National Education. The important funding is done through the European funds and the Education Ministry. Some additional funding are also provided by European and National Framework research projects, through the third bodies and other ministries that can receive various services by the Higher Education Institutions. It offers a wide range courses of various types.

The Greek universities are involved with various programmes (both undergraduate and postgraduate), with some other applied and basic research.

Institutions for Higher Education

One of the basic requirements to get admitted for tertiary education is score that is achieved on the ‘Certificate’ (Bebaiosi) which have in it the grades of six subjects where the final examination is done at national level. The overall score is taken into account in the school grade of final year, (evaluation of school level) and the grades achieved on that all subjects of the examinations held at the national level.

Based on the ranking of the performance of the student and the general score that is obtained on the leaving certificate examination, students are admitted to each Technological Educational Institutes and universities.

There are a total of 22 Universities in Greece, including the the Hellenic Open University (EAP), Fine Arts School and the Polytechnic Schools, the School of Pedagogic and Technological Education (ASPETAI) and 14 Technological Educational Institutes (T.E.I.)

The Institutes of higher education in Greece developes their curriculum on their own and later these gets published in the Greek Government Official Journal and hence comes up review in every two years. The accreditation and the validation of the course  is subject to The National Council of Education (ESYP), which is the advisory body. However, Higher Education Institutes in Greece has awards and qualifications of their own (Diploma, Degree, MSc, Doctorate). The institutes also formulate various policies for reaching their goals and also to fulfill their mission.

A national credit system exists in higher education in both the sectors since 1980s. This is a system of accumulation where credits are equal to the weekly hours of instruction. ECTS is used mainly by the institutions in both the sectors of University and technological as a system of transfer for programmes of European mobility. The law on Quality Assurance of 2005 for Higher Education uses ECTS for accumulation transfer compulsory in two-types programmes at all institutions of higher education. ECTS is currently implemented full-fledged and both systems are in proper use.

The institutions of Higher education set their mechanisms for quality assurance which provides a basis for evaluation. The main aim of the higher education institution is to bring together accountability and institutional autonomy effectively under national quality regulations framework . Each institution possess decision-making right and is fully responsible for creating quality assurance system of its own for evaluating their administrative and education and research functions, though there are general provisions that are mentioned in the legislation. The teaching, administrative staffs as well as the students are the important contributors and participants in the process.

All successful candidates are awarded with a degree of Ptychio which helps them to get employed or even do further studies at the pg level. The T.E.I. and the University graduates can also attain a PhD if they can reach the the standard that is set up by the department which runs the study program.

As per the Greek Constitution, the system of higher education is public and can be solely provided by the state itself. The UG level courses free of charge and there are fees applicable for MSc that are also set up by the departments that runs the study programmes.

The State Scholarships Foundation offers scholarship to meritorious students who wants to pursue study at the institutions offering tertiary education. The Scholarships are also offered to the various graduates of institutions of technical education and universities for post-doctoral or post-graduate studies purely based on their  academic achievement in undergraduate studies. Further, students (at any course level) can obtain grants to pursue courses in Higher Education Institutes in Europe under the Lifelong Learning Programmes.
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