Academy or university - which is higher?

The current system of higher education in Russia and the CIS countries is represented by three main types of educational institutions: the institute, the university and the academy. For those wishing to get higher education and choosing who to enroll after the 11th grade , the most urgent questions are: what is higher, the academy or the university? And how does the academy differ from the university?

The status of the academy and university

The status of universities depends primarily on the direction of education.

The Academy is a higher educational institution that implements the educational programs of university and postgraduate studies and conducts research in certain fields of science (for example, the Academy of Forestry or the Art Academy). In accordance with the licensing requirements in the academy for 100 students must have at least 2 graduate students, and 55% of the teaching staff should have academic degrees and degrees.

The university is an institution of higher education, carrying out multidisciplinary training and retraining in various specialties. The University is engaged in fundamental and applied research in a wide range of sciences. For every hundred students in accordance with the requirements should be no less than 4 post-graduate students, 60% of teachers should be with academic degrees and titles.

The youngest educational institution is the institution - in pre-revolutionary Russia institutes were educational institutions of very narrow specialization. Unlike the university and the academy, the institute is not a methodical center.

To help applicants to choose the best university or academy, we emphasize the main difference between the academy and the university.

The difference between the academy and the university

  1. The academies train specialists of a certain orientation, universities conduct multidisciplinary training.
  2. Studies conducted at the academy are held in one of the scientific areas. Scientific work at the university is conducted in several directions.
  3. At the university, the requirements for the qualification of the teaching staff are somewhat higher and the requirements for postgraduate education are stricter.

Summarizing the above information, we can conclude that the difference between the academy and the university is negligible. Therefore, when choosing the educational institution, we recommend to focus on the position of the university in special rating tables.