Education expert Simon Janashia says one of the best ways to assess Georgia’s higher education reform is to compare the government’s promises with the results. The reform changed university funding, abolished state grants, made tuition free at public universities, introduced the “one city – one faculty” model, and reduced academic programs and admission quotas.
Janashia said the reform was supposed to redistribute students from Tbilisi to other cities, but the opposite has happened. 88% of applicants from Kakheti are now enrolling in Tbilisi, while students in regional cities have fewer opportunities to study subjects previously available locally. He also said the planned concentration of professors in fewer universities has instead resulted in many academics losing jobs.
According to Janashia, the “one city – one faculty” principle has also been applied selectively. He pointed to cases where the same fields remain available at multiple universities, while programs such as law were concentrated in specific cities. He also criticized the new funding model, saying high-scoring students who previously chose private universities have moved to public institutions, putting regional students with lower scores at a disadvantage.
Janashia also raised concerns over the sharp reduction in places at Ilia State University, which admitted just 338 students instead of around 4,000 this year. He linked the cuts to the government’s strained relations with critical academic circles and noted that the university has around 1,000 invited professors whose future employment is now uncertain.
