Children of war without the right to make mistakes: important changes in the rules for obtaining educational grants for undergraduate students

The full-scale war turned Ukrainian education into a constant risk zone: destroyed schools, evacuation of teachers, online lessons in bomb shelters, and in many regions, no access to a normal educational process at all. However, for hundreds of thousands of teenagers, the war did not become a reason to give up education. On the contrary, to get a higher education, get a profession and become useful for the country after school has now become the challenge of a generation. In the conditions of the gap between reality and the desire to learn, when children of war are preparing for the national multi-subject test not in classrooms, but in displaced families, dormitories, abroad, the Ministry of Education and Science is revising the mechanisms of access to higher education funding. In 2025, changes affected the rules for receiving grants: now the possibility to combine the contractual form of education with the state educational grant has become limited.

This year, as in the previous three, the admission campaign is based on the results of the national multi-subject test (NMT). However, Deputy Minister of Education and Science Mykhailo Vynnytskyi reported, that now entrants should be especially careful in choosing priorities. For the first time, the state introduces a rule according to which applicants who receive a recommendation for the budget, but deliberately choose a contract, will lose the right to receive a grant. This means that the education grant is no longer a tool of “parallel support” for those who had the opportunity to study for free, but deliberately chose otherwise.

Vynnytskyi explains: last year, a large number of rejections from budget places were recorded. The reasons for this were different: someone wanted to study in a specialty other than the budget, someone wanted to enter another city, others did not trust the quality of education at regional universities. In the conditions of war, when the funding of each student is almost nominal, and the cost of education, accommodation and support increases every month, the state cannot afford to finance those who refuse the given advantage.

That is why, from 2025, the Ministry introduced a simple rule: if the entrant received a recommendation for the budget and refused, even with the highest NMT scores, he will no longer be able to receive an educational grant for the contract. He will have to pay for his education entirely at his own expense. This approach does not apply only to those who did not qualify for budget places from the very beginning – they still have the right to apply for grant support.

The wording is clear: the applicant has the right to choose one of two options — either the budget or a contract with a grant. But not both options at the same time. The grant system is no longer a “parallel” aid, but only a compensation mechanism for those who could not take advantage of free education.

The deputy minister emphasized that the state does not limit the opportunities of entrants, but forces them to make an informed choice. The essence of the innovation is not to punish, but to force you to evaluate your own trajectory, priorities and financial realities. In conditions where the grant is part of a limited wartime education budget, every decision has weight. If the student does not take the proposed budget place, then the funds should automatically go to someone else who needs this support.

These changes are not only an administrative innovation, but affect approaches to planning the educational future as a whole. After all, a large number of children who are currently completing the NMT are those who studied in evacuation, who lost contact with teachers, who did not have physical access to textbooks, but at the same time dream of education. Many aspire to return to Ukraine for the sake of university, some study at a foreign school, but complete the NMT remotely. For such teenagers, education is not a comfort, but a survival strategy.

The record results of this year’s NMT, which have already been reported by the Ministry of Education, demonstrate that even in difficult conditions, thousands of applicants achieve high scores. However, now success in the test alone does not guarantee financial support, the results must be correlated with the choice of priorities. And if you have given up a place according to the first priority, the state will no longer compensate for your studies, even if you get a contract at your dream university.

For many children of war who are preparing to enter from abroad today, these changes mean that every priority given on the application is a fateful decision. And how carefully it will be accepted will depend on whether the child will receive assistance from the state or will remain with a contract that the family will have to pay completely independently. In a situation where survival and education have become interdependent, the right to a grant is no longer guaranteed even to the strongest.