Surge in PhDs in Switzerland driven by international students

According to a report from Swiss universities in the French-part of the country, the number of PhD students in Switzerland is steadily increasing. Their numbers have doubled over the past 30 years, largely due to the influx of international students. A PhD, or doctorate, is the degree awarded for academic research, usually achieved by completing a doctoral thesis. + Sign up to get the most important news from Switzerland directly in your inbox Last year, Swiss universities had 21,200 PhD students in fields like physics, computer science, gender studies, law, and art history –twice as many as 30 years ago, according to an annual report from the Conference of Western Swiss Universities (CUSO). This increase in the number of PhD students is entirely due to the recruitment of international students. Denis Billotte, General Secretary of CUSO, points out that the proportion of foreign PhD students varies widely across different fields. Mechanical engineering (around 80%) and natural ...