Student budget

Large part of the education sector is still in the public domain and are financed by Swiss taxpayers. Only a few universities require foreign students to pay an additional fee, which is between Swiss Franc (SFR) 50,000 and SFR 150,000 per year.

 

Your budget

As such, you can anticipate a minimum cost of SFR 16,000 to SFR 24,000 per year, depending on where you study (Geneva and Zurich being considered as more expensive) and your standard of living.
 

Working as a student

When you apply for residence permit, you need to prove the Embassy and the Alien Police that you would be able to support yourself financially. A bank statement or similar authenticated document will do. The idea is that you cannot finance your studies solely through supplementary work in Switzerland. Education must be the main reason for your stay.
 

However, once you’ve proven you have the financial resources necessary to study in Switzerland, you can work alongside your studies. In fact, the student residence permit allows for profit-earning activity, as long your university provides a statement confirming that your employment will not prolong the length of your studies. 
 

In actual practice, many students – Swiss and foreign alike – work alongside their studies to earn pocket money and gain professional experience. For foreign students, the number of weekly work hours is limited to 15, but this is fairly flexible depending on the canton (in Geneva, for example, you can work up to 30 hours per week).

Nevertheless, most people will advise you not to take on extra work, since the university workload is already quite heavy, depending on the faculty. But if you feel sure of yourself, if you’re a fast learner and are physically and mentally fit, why not give it a try?
 

It is easier to find employment in the large urban centers like Geneva and Zurich. Each university has a job placement office that provides information on student employment. Wages vary between SFR 20 and SFR 35 according to the job and your skills.
 

Higher education and specialsed training colleges 

Aside from the university programmes available in Switzerland, there are also vocational training programmes that offer graduate diplomas specific to a given profession. A competent network is currently undergoing development. There over 60 schools (advanced technical colleges, commercial and management colleges, etc.) and over 250 programmes within seven colleges of higher education. Instruction for the some 18,000 students of these colleges will focus on the fields of technology, architecture, economics and design.
 

In addition to the aforementioned educational institutes, there are a number of private universities and colleges in Switzerland based more or less on the Anglo-American system. The programmes and diplomas offered by these colleges are not recognized in Switzerland, and some them may even offer courses that are not serious branches of study. We therefore advise anyone interested in following such a course to make careful initial investigations into the issue of recognition of the qualifications that it confers. Conditions for admission also change according to the establishment, so it is best to contact the institute of your choice directly.
 

To learn about the conditions for foreign student admission in these schools, we advise you to contact the:

Swiss Conference of Cantonal Directors of Education (EDK)
directly. College of Higher Education Council
Zähringerstrasse 25
Case postale 5975
CH-3001 Berne
Tel.: 0041 31 309 51 11
Fax: 0041 31 309 51 50
e-mail: edk@edk.ch