The Cabinet of Ministers will cease funding schools with fewer than 45 students starting September 1
This was reported by the Ministry of Education and Science in response to a request from hromadske.
Starting September 1, 2025, schools (except for primary education institutions) with fewer than 45 students will no longer be funded from the educational subvention, and from September 1, 2026 — fewer than 60 students.
Currently, there is no information about the number of such institutions. The Ministry of Education and Science states that this will be available after submitting the statistical report for the new 2025-2026 academic year.
It should be noted that this is not the first such decision; since September 1, 2016, schools with fewer than 25 students have not been funded from the educational subvention.
According to the Ministry of Education and Science, the government spends on average 30,400 hryvnias per year on the education of one student from a village, and 24,400 hryvnias in a city. In some villages, the cost of educating one student exceeds 51,000 hryvnias. This is due to the need to maintain and pay salaries to staff of many schools with few students.
The decision to reorganize, liquidate, or reprofile (change the type of) an educational institution is made by local councils. This means that local self-government bodies can decide either to transport students from these schools to the nearest larger school or to pay teachers' salaries of small schools from local budgets.