TALLINN — A 9 percent budget cut to Estonian higher education is not hitting all the country’s universities the same.
In it’s drive to stay within the Maastricht criteria for eurozone entry, the 2010 national budget left few ministries cut-free, and education was no exception. The education budget was cut by 9 percent, 106 million krooni (€6.7 million) and as a consequence the Ministry of Education and Science reduced student base costs, which cover per-student teaching expenses.
Rein Joamets, a spokesman of the Ministry of Education and Science, said that by cutting student base costs, the damage would be spread more evenly across universities.
“Of course all the aspects of cuts were considered, but cuts of the student base costs means cutting jointly and avoids making some painful decisions on a certain university or major,” Joamets told Baltic Reports.
Universities face different prospects
However, due to the different financial statuses of Estonia’s universities before the per-student cost cut was implemented, its affect is not being felt the same in different campuses.
Tallinn Technical University was forced to reduce the costs of academic structures by 8 percent, administrative costs and expenses on support structures and overall costs were reduced by 16.1 percent in its 2010 budget.
Ardo Kamratov, director of finance at Tallinn Technical said that the cuts are directly affecting the university’s operative costs despite the number of students significantly increasing over the previous years. More than 14,000 students were accepted in the fall of 2009.
“The salaries of many employees have been reduced, although the teaching capacity has increased,” Kamratov told Baltic Reports.
Kamratov assured that the quality of teaching will not be damaged largely thanks to the reserves that were collected when the times were better and are used now, but cautioned this may change if future cuts are implemented.
On the other hand, the University of Tartu is being forced to reduce funding for social action programs such as small humanitarian professions, interpreter trainings and others. Some majors have also been put on hold such as sign language interpretation, and several programs will be merged.
“In some occasions we are considering offering some smaller majors as additional trainings,” Birute Klaas, rector of studies in University of Tartu, told Baltic Reports. “Faculties and institutions that have a huge part in labor expenses are forced to cut their wages.”
The University of Tallinn were least affected by the cut. The university board passed the 2010 budget taking the 9.1 into account managing to avoid the large drop of income which is now only 1 percent smaller than 2009 budget.
Maiki Voore, spokeswoman of University of Tallinn told that the small drop of income is largely thanks to the increasing number of students who pay for their studies.
“As the university’s budget was cut only by 1 percent, then the university does not have to give up on much of anything,” Voore told Baltic Reports.
Long-term loss
The overall cuts have educators worried about the long-term improvement of Estonian education on a global field of competition in which students can easily study in other countries, particularly within the European Union.
“When it comes to the funding of higher education, we unfortunately are moving in opposite direction than was planned in the Strategy of Higher Education 2006-2015 official statement, aiming for the improvement of higher education,” Mart Laidmets, chief of the higher education department in the Ministry of Education and Science told Baltic Reports.
