Sooner than later, most international candidates planning to study in Ukraine will be faced with the need to choose which of the university admission processing options to go with.

This is quite an important decision to make early on, as jumping from one to the other is a sure recipe for confusion. That’s the last thing you want in your menu, as a candidate.

The good news is that there are only two Ukraine university admission processing options, that are recognized by the law, namely:

1. Direct-Processing;
2. Assisted-Processing.

While they might appear intuitive, which is true, both have their merits and demerits, their pros & cons on why one may be more suitable than the other, for a particular candidate. That’s what this post will explore in details, so read on.

Direct Admission Processing Option.

With direct admission processing option, the candidate personally handles the entire admission processes, by direct communications with the university.

This allows the candidate to fully get involved and be part of the entire admission process. During that time, the candidate also becomes well acquainted with the prospective university and starts experiencing a glimpse of what to expect, while building a relationship.

This, however, requires a lot of efforts from the candidate, who will have to spend a lot of time scouring the internet for useful information, and undergo a barrage of email ping pongs while sifting through a lot of junks and outright deceptions.

Understandably, this may not be for everyone. There are those who just don’t care about the mechanics, and simply want results. There’s nothing wrong with that, it’s all about personal choices.

When completed successfully, there is a sense of exhilaration, fulfilment and a deep feeling of satisfaction that accompanies such results from personal efforts. Most importantly, you also save a substantial amount of money that would’ve been spent on the services of an admission agent /  intermediary company.

Contrary to what many may think, this is not as scary as it may appear. There are lots of universities that are actively in search of qualified international candidates.

The real challenge is having the time and patience to find one of those, among the gazillion junks and traps that are deliberately set by fraudsters to catch the innocent and unsuspecting candidate.

One important caveat, though, is that this method may not be possible for certain universities, where some intermediary companies have monopolized the admission process. For such universities, the assisted option is inevitable.

There are quite a good number of such universities in each region, but there are also lots of universities that are willing to offer direct admission to qualified international candidates.

So overall, it is worth giving a try, as long as you understand that you could waste a lot of time in the process, and still end up unsuccessful. Notwithstanding, the success rate is also high.

As you can see, it is not that scary as it seems.

There is one issue that may be intimidating to some candidates, which is the challenge of finding and contacting universities.

Some candidates do not know how to find the universities, how to contact them and how exactly to formulate their request, especially considering that Ukraine is not an English speaking country.

These are all legitimate concerns but are part of what comes with the bargain. One way to get started to find and contact the universities is to use this list of universities available from Wikipedia.

Now, if all of these still appear confusing, maybe you just don’t want to mess with the bolts and nuts, or you simply don’t have the time for trials and errors, then you’re most likely a candidate for the assisted admission processing option.

Assisted Admission Processing Option

As the name suggests, assisted admission processing option is primarily using the services of an intermediary company, which has a contractual partnership with one or more universities in Ukraine, to process university admission for a candidate.

The admission is processed in one of the universities where the intermediary company has a contractual partnership, or in the university as requested by the candidate and mutually agreed by both the candidate and the company.

This option, is the most popular all over the web, typically because it is primarily a profit-oriented commercial activity and actively promoted. Heck, we’re one of them 🙂

The services of the intermediary companies are not limited to only processing university admissions, but also include airport meetup on arrival, university registration/enrollment, medical tests, processing residential permit as well as assisting the student during the adaptation period.

These are all paid services, and together constitute the company’s service fees.

When the admission processing is completed by university, the company collects and sends the university invitation letter to the candidate, to continue with the visa processing part.

In some cases, some companies also render extra services such as preparations for visa documentation and interview.

Obviously, this option is less stressful than the direct admission processing route, and also faster because the intermediary company handles all the nitty-gritty aspects of the admission processing, having an already established workflow.

The major drawback to this option, for some candidates, is that it can leave a substantial financial vacuum in the candidate’s pocket, and therefore, might be a deal-breaker, especially for candidates on a tight budget.

For candidates that can afford the cost, and want the convenience of speed and certainty, or for candidates already running out of time to process the admission, then assisted admission processing option might be the only choice.

The questions you might have are:

• Which of the two admission processing options is preferable?
• Which of the two has more chances of success?
• Is one option given more preference to the other, by the university?

To summarize it, none of the options could be said to be preferable over the other, as both are recognized by regulations and authorized. It depends on the personal choices of the candidate and the available resources at his / her disposal.

However, the assisted admission processing option has a slight edge of success over the direct processing option, simply because the intermediary companies are localized, have an already established workflow, and with direct access to the universities in the local language.

All of these gives them an edge over the lone candidate struggling to gather all the necessary information.

With regards to universities, their main interest is to recruit enough students for the academic session. Unfortunately, most do not have enough personnel dedicated to direct recruitment of international students, a gap that’s filled by the intermediary companies.

So, while many universities do direct recruitment, they are, however, constrained by a limited workforce that’s dedicated for this purpose. As a direct consequence, they tend to rely more on the intermediary companies, which may seem like a preference, but is not.