With the new academic year MU has grown by more 450 exchange students and 474 students beginning English-language programmes. For incoming students the MU Centre for International Cooperation together with MU faculties held Orientation Week, which took place partly online. But they did not lose out on taking the traditional Brno City Tour or attending the International Dinner.
Faculties welcome new students at outdoor events
Some MU faculties celebrated the beginning of the new academic year with outdoor events. For example, students and teachers filled the courtyards of the Faculty of Arts and the Faculty of Economics and Administration. The Faculty of Medicine and the Faculty of Social Studies, where the most foreign students paying tuition study, also organized welcome meetings for foreign students.
On the Friday before the new academic year began, the Faculty of Medicine held a barbecue at the Bohunice Campus, where 200 new medicine and dentistry students were greeted by the dean of the Faculty of Medicine, Martin Repko.
“I welcome all new foreign students to the Faculty of Medicine of Masaryk University. I am very glad that you have chosen to study at our faculty. I am convinced that you will be satisfied with the quality of teaching and that studying here and taking courses in our new, one-of-a-kind simulation centre will provide you with a wonderful foundation for your future careers. I hope that you take advantage of Brno as a university town and this unique stage in life, the start of your careers as doctors,” said Dean Martin Repko, welcoming the incoming students.
Seven student ambassadors from the Faculty of Medicine also welcomed them. Watch a short video in which these ambassadors answer applicants’ questions about the Faculty of Medicine, Brno, and the Czech Republic.
In the second week of the semester the Faculty of Social Studies also held a barbecue in Špilberk park, which was attended by over 100 students who study in foreign-language programmes at the faculty or who have come to Brno for shorter exchanges.
“I am very glad that I can finally welcome in person not only first-year students but also second-year students, who due to the pandemic had to study online all last year, so they didn’t have the opportunity get to know the faculty and Brno. I am sure that in this academic year we will have more chances to meet in person and that such opportunities will only increase in the spring,” said Petr Suchý, vice-dean for internationalization and student affairs, welcoming the foreign students.
Watch a short video to find out what foreign students found most surprising about the Czech Republic and what they like most about the Faculty of Social Studies and Brno:
Twenty percent of MU’s student body are foreigners
A total of 1,439 foreign students study at Masaryk University in 34 foreign-language bachelor’s and master’s programmes. The most (885) study at the Faculty of Medicine, followed by the Faculty of Social Studies (254) and the Faculty of Economics and Administration (110).
Tuition-paying students also study at MU’s other faculties: the Faculty of Education (51), the Faculty of Arts (38), the Faculty of Pharmacy (35), and the Faculty of Informatics (43). This year the Faculty of Science opened its first master’s programme taught in English, Molecular and Cell Biology, which accepted six applicants from Europe and Asia.
Besides these tuition-paying students, nearly 5,000 Slovaks and more than 600 students from 36 countries around the world study in Czech-language bachelor’s and master’s programmes. Moreover, there are also 877 doctoral students from other countries. More than 20 percent of MU students come from abroad.