University of Eastern Finland awards a record number of Master’s degrees

The number of Master’s degrees awarded by the university each year continues to grow steadily, with last year being an all-time record-breaking year. The largest numbers of Master’s degrees were completed in the fields of education, social sciences, business studies, and law.

According to the university’s Academic Rector Tapio Määttä, the growth in the number of Master’s degrees awarded is explained by increasingly attractive Master’s degree programmes as well as by previous years’ higher student intake numbers.

“Out of the Master’s degree programme graduates, 198 were international students. The growth can also be explained by additional funding granted to the university in 2014–2015 to remove bottlenecks blocking entry to university, leading to a temporary increase of around 200 in student intake numbers,” Määttä says.

Määttä also estimates that the switch to partially online mode of teaching due to the coronavirus pandemic has made it easier for students to finalise their degrees.

“Our online teaching solutions have made it easier for students to flexibly combine studies and work, and this has been beneficial to some of them. I would like to express my warmest thanks to all our teachers for their flexibility in teaching under the exceptional circumstances we witnessed last year,” Määttä says.

The number of doctoral degrees awarded grew by 20 in comparison to the previous year. 2020 was the second-best year in the history of the University of Eastern Finland in terms of the number of doctoral degrees awarded.  The Faculty of Health Sciences awarded 58 doctorates, the Faculty of Science and Forestry 64, the Faculty of Social Sciences and Business Studies 28, and the Philosophical Faculty 16.

It is possible that some isolated degrees will still be included in the statistics for 2020.

For further information, please contact:

Academic Rector Tapio Määttä, tapio.maatta (a) uef.fi, tel. +358 50 575 1589