University of Tartu and Ministry of Education and Research signed the higher education funding agreement

Rector Toomas Asser and Minister of Education and Research Tõnis Lukas signed the higher education funding agreement between the Ministry of Education and Research and the University of Tartu for 2023. The agreement gives the university the necessary assurance about this year’s funding.

According to the agreement, the total funds for the activity support for higher education, targeted support, doctoral allowances, students’ achievement stipends and need-based special allowances are 84.4 million euros. This amount includes

• activity support for higher education, 63.8 million euros, which is growing as agreed in the state budget strategy. It enables to alleviate the current funding issues and raise the competitiveness of employees’ salaries;
• targeted support of 10.3 million euros, including, for example, nearly 5 million euros for increasing the admission of teacher education and support specialists, 1.5 million euros for supporting the studies of Ukrainian students, and additional support to enhance Estonian language learning;
• the fund for junior research fellows’ salaries of 6 million euros and doctoral allowances of 3.2 million euros.

25.3 million euros are allocated for research and development funding in 2023, and its biggest part is for baseline research funding, 23.5 million euros.

This year’s activity support allocated to the university is 2.5 million euros more than budgeted. At the council meeting in Viljandi on 13 March, the rector proposed distributing the money to the faculties for salary support, according to the proportions approved by the 2023 budget. The council members agreed that as the university’s current strategic objective is to increase academic staff salaries, the proposal for using the additional budget is justified.