Public Perceptions of Private Universities and Colleges in Bulgaria

Abstract

The appearance of private institutions of higher education after the political changes of 1989 signaled a transformation for the entire system of higher education in Bulgaria. Although private funding for education has its history—best exemplified by a large donation for the establishment of Sofia University,1 Bulgaria’s oldest and largest university—the country has no long-standing tradition in private higher education. As in most communist countries of Central and Eastern Europe, no private institution functioned during the almost half a century of communist rule in Bulgaria. And prior to communism, the private higher education sector was marginal and lacked broad acceptance by the academic community, the political elite, and the public at-large. The Free University in Sofia, founded in 1920 and nationalized in 1939, was the only private institution of higher education in Bulgaria prior to the communist take-over (Boyadjieva 2003). In 1938, a special legal order determined the privileged status of state2 institutions of higher education. It denied private institutions the right to call themselves universities, to offer programs available in state institutions, or to award diplomas in higher education. When seen in this light, the establishment of private institutions of higher education after 1989 represents a radical development in the Bulgarian higher education system.3