ATHENS: Students from across Greece protested in Athens on Thursday against the planned introduction of private universities, a reform that has riled the country’s higher education community. Some 15,000 students demonstrated in the capital, police said.

Around 150 university faculties around Greece are being occupied by students as part of a protest now in its fifth week. “(Public) universities are already underfunded,” said Eleni Iatrou, an agronomy student at the university of the Peloponnese who travelled to Athens for the rally.

“If private universities also start offering degrees, state funding for public universities will fall even further,” she said. Under the plan, private non-profit universities will begin taking applications in September 2025. Many university professors also oppose private institutions, which the students argue will offer lower entry requirements in return for hefty fees. “There is no guarantee of quality at private universities and the cost of studying will rise,” said Alexandra Balantina, a musicology professor at the Ionian university of Corfu.

Some 200 professors signed a petition this week condemning the government’s “malicious” efforts to overcome resistance to the reform, and refused to participate in online exams held in faculties where students are staging sit-ins.

The government says the reform will enable Greek public universities to enter into partnerships with prestigious foreign academic institutions, improving their international appeal. It has pledged to introduce strict rules for the way private institutions function.

Published in Dawn, February 9th, 2024