The number of Russian students in Norway has increased immensely during the last year. Even Swedes and Germans are outnumbered by our populous Eastern neighbor.

2010-09-08 På norsk

Since 2009 the number of Russians students in Norway has increased by 33 percent and the Russians make up the largest group of international students in Norway.

The biggest growth of Russian students has not surprisingly happened in the northern part of Norway and especially at Bodø University College (HiBO). Anatoli Bourmistov is a professor at HiBO, and he is also the program consultant for one of the first Norwegian-Russian collaboration projects that started as early as in 1991. He thinks the Russian students have two main reasons for choosing Norway as a place to complete their studies.

– First of all Norway has had an increased focus on Russia and there is a lot of academic collaboration going on in the north. Second of all Norway is an attractive place to study because it is fairly cheap to study here.
The living cost is undoubtedly high here but I think more and more Russians understand that they do not need to spend a large amount of money. You don´t have to go to the pub every night, says Bourmistov.

– Norway is my home

The students Nina Zelenkova from Moscow and Tatiana Yuryeva from Irkutsk are surprised by the news.

– I attended a Norwegian-Russian upper secondary school in Moscow because I thought Norway was an exotic country. The school cooperated with Ålesund University College so when I got the possibility to go there, I did. Now I´m completing my Master´s at the Centre for Development and the Environment and I regard Norway as my second home, says Zelenkova.
For Yuryeva it was more of a coincidence that she came to Norway.

– I´ve never had a dream about going to Norway but it was easy to get a visa. I started out as an au pair at a French family´s house and I liked Norway so much that I decided to stay, says Yuryeva, who is now studying Norwegian at the University of Oslo.

Was talented, came to Norway

Inna Bespalaya is a second year student at Bodø Graduate School of Business (HHB). She chose to study in Norway because her Russian university is connected to HHB.

– I completed my Master´s at the Baltic State Technical University in St.
Petersburg, which has been cooperating with HHB since 1991. As one of the six best students in my year I was offered another Master´s study at HHB.
At one point Inna considered going to England to study, but she could not afford it. At the same time she was hearing many positive things about Norway.

– Norway is expensive but due to the cooperation between my Russian university and HHB I get a full scholarship and loan from the State Education Fund. That does make it easier to come here but the most important reason is that I heard so many good things about the line of study and about Norway. The students who had studied here before had only good things to say, and they got good jobs when they returned, says Bespalaya.

Main focus in the north

State Secretary Kyrre Lekve in the Ministry of Education and Research is somewhat surprised by the fact that the Russians are the largest group of foreign students, but not by the fact that the growth has been taking place mostly in the northern part of the country.

– In the north we have the same research agendas as the Russians. There are several exchange programs and in general there is a lot of cooperation going on. It is not like we hide the Russians away in northern Norway, but that is the place where the main focus is right now. In time we hope that a strong Norwegian-Russian research environment in the north will ramify in the south. The biggest challenge now is to get more Norwegians to study in Russia. In 2009 only 75 Norwegians went on exchange to Russia, says Lekve.

– This is great!

Senior researcher at the Norwegian Institute for International Affairs (NUPI) Jakub M. Godzimirski thinks there are several reasons for the increase of Russian students in Norway.

– The most important thing is probably that Norway has a good reputation in Russia, as a country good for studying in but also as a country of many possibilities in general, say Godzimirski.

Manager of Norwegian-Russian Chamber of Commerce Jarle Forbord is positive towards the development.

– This is great! We really do appreciate that more Russians decide to complete their studies in Norway. It is a great advantage in the development of an economic collaboration, says Forbord.

Andreas Sveen Bjørnstad • Ketil Blom (foto) • Translation by Ingrid F.
Brubaker