Introduction

In the countries of the Carpathian Basin, where Hungarian national minorities live (Slovakia, Romania, Ukraine, Serbia and Croatia), it has been a significant problem that the proportion of those having obtained university degree within ethnic minorities is a lot lower than the one within the majority. Consequently, the number of those ethnic Hungarians who have earned a university degree in the above mentioned countries is a lot lower than it should be on the basis of their proportion in the population.

In the 15 year-period following the change of regime in Slovakia, the education of the Hungarian national minorities was not able to follow the dynamic development - which could be detected primarily in the large number of students enrolled - in higher education. By the beginning of 2000 a considerable fallback could be experienced. While at the turn of the millennium the proportion of Hungarian national minority was around 10 per cent, the proportion of the people participating in higher education did not reach 5% (this number was even worse than the rate in 1990) (László, B. 2004).

Between 1990 and 2001 the number of university students belonging to the Hungarian minority was unevenly distributed among the different fields of sciences (arts and humanities, law, technical sciences, economics, agriculture, etc.) The highest rate of increase in the number of students intake effected the fields of economics and technical sciences. At the same time, this increase was considerably lower than that in Hungary. This disadvantage in almost all fields has become relatively stable. (László, B. 2004)

Therefore, the establishment and gradual development of Hungarian higher education beyond the borders of Hungary became one of the most important foreign policy issues after the political-economic change of regime. In cooperation with Hungarian ethnic institutions and political parties, Hungary has made increased efforts to assist in the reaching of this aim. As a result, several Hungarian institutions of higher education were established: the Teachers' Training College in Berehovo (Sub-Carpathia, Ukraine, 1997); the Sapientia University of Transylvania (Transylvania, Romania, 2001) and the Christian University of Partium (Partium, Romania, 2001). Similarly, J. Selye University opened its gates in Komárno, Slovakia in 2003. The establishment of this institution proved to be a significant step forward towards the increasing of the level of higher education of the Hungarian minority in their mother tongue (Baros, R. 2004).