On Jan. 30, the academic council of Kharkiv National Pedagogical University named after H.S. Skovoroda decided to introduce the position of an authorized person on the state language functioning. This was reported on Feb. 20 on the university`s official website.

The head of the Ukrainian language department, candidate of philological sciences, and associate professor Natalia Shcherbakova became the language ombudsman. She will monitor the use of the Ukrainian language at the university.

The innovation is aimed to protect the rights of students to receive educational services in Ukrainian. Moreover, it is made for educative reasons to promote state language usage and improve the level of Ukrainian language proficiency. The university introduced Ukrainian language courses for employees.

In January, Kharkiv National University named after V. N. Karazin also appointed the state language ombudsman. Mykola Filon is a candidate of philological sciences, head of the Ukrainian language department, and deputy dean of the philological faculty for scientific work.

Earlier, it was reported that the number of international students in Kharkiv universities decreased by almost 40%, 12,165 foreign students from 102 countries study at city universities as of Jan. 1, 2023.