Until 2023, UNR had an average of 20000 pre-registrations per year. In two years, it grew by more than 50%, and by 2025, the number of pre-registrations had already exceeded 30100, a record that has no precedent in its entire history.
The new degree courses that have been added in recent years have caused an exponential increase in the number of students who enroll year after year to pursue their higher education in the Universidad Nacional de Rosario (UNR). These are courses with a maximum duration of 4 years, with modern curricular designs that respond to the demands of students and the world of work.
“UNR is undergoing an unprecedented expansion process in its history. Never before have so many new courses been created in such a short period of time, never before have so many new schools been created in so few years, never has UNR’s presence in the entire central-southern part of the province been as strong as it is now, and never have we had such a pronounced growth in enrollment as in the last two years,” said UNR Rector Franco Bartolacci.
“It was not easy, it is not easy, because we had to do all of that in complex contexts like the ones we have gone through over the last 5 years, but there is no greater satisfaction than seeing how the enormous effort of a community to fulfill its mission is reflected in the arrival of thousands of new young people to the University, young people who previously did not come because they could not or because what they aspired to study was simply not included in the public proposal of the UNR,” he added.
“We believed that we had to make the University more present where it was not and do more things so that those who could not do so could come to UNR. And one of the ways to meet that objective was to multiply and diversify the traditional training proposal of UNR. With that conviction, we proposed to create one or two new courses each year. With a lot of effort, because we did not receive additional funding for this, but rather we did it by optimizing what we had, redirecting funds for this priority objective. Additionally, we decided to face that challenge not by replicating existing course formats but by building more modern ones. The world is changing rapidly, the country is not the same as three decades ago, the world of work needs other profiles, and if the University does not want to lose relevance it could not continue doing the same things as before. So we decided to multiply the academic proposal of the University by modernizing ourselves, putting ourselves more in tune with the world we live in. And the result is there for all to see, never before has the entry been so large, which confirms that this is the way forward,” said Bartolacci.
With the impetus of these new degree courses, the number of pre-registrations for this year 30.124 rises to 2025, while in 2024 there were 25.808 and in 2023 there were 20.667, registering an increase of 5 thousand more for each year. These numbers are supported by the students who join courses such as Data Science, which this year will have its first cohort with 702 enrolled. “Data Science is a good example, it is the reconversion and complementation of the statistics course that our University had, the oldest in Latin America. Until last year it had an average annual enrollment of 100 students, with this new format it exceeded 700,” said the Academic Secretary of the UNR, Romina Perez, who is in charge of the operation of this process.
The bachelor's degrees that began last year, and in 2025 will have their second batch of registrants, are Real Estate Brokerage with 598 enrolled, and Citizen Security with 180. While the Design variants do not stop their climb of new students that exceeds each year, they are now in their third promotion with 1274 enrolled in Graphic Design - taught in Architecture - and 760 in Clothing Design, taught in Humanities. In 2024, between the two careers they added 1670 students, and in their first promotion there were 2275 entrants. The possibility of studying Design in the public sphere was a debt to society that could only access these academic paths in the private circuit. It is already in its third year with a free degree offer, a modern and technological curriculum linked to the productive and industrial development of the region. In Architecture, since 2019, Industrial Design is also available, with an incessant number of entrants that this year amounts to 331. Last year, it had its first graduate. (https://unr.edu.ar/la-primera-egresada-de-diseno-industrial/)
In the branch of Engineering, the university technical degree in Artificial Intelligence is at the top of the ranking with 929 pre-registrations, to which are added 323 students who are beginning the degree course in Computer Science. Another proposal that continues to grow is the Bachelor's Degree in Tourism - created in 2018 - which is in its eighth cohort with 662 pre-registrations. This degree was the first to be formed with a joint management of two academic units, based on Economic Sciences and Political Science. Thus, in 2023 there were 436 entrants, in 2024 there were 562 and this year that number rose by around 40%.
The plan for next year is to open the new Faculty of Human Movement and Care Sciences with the creation of the Physical Education Teaching degree, the Bachelor's degree in Sports and the Technical degree in Accompaniment of the Elderly, a major commitment to settle a debt with this branch of knowledge that until now had not been included in the UNR's free undergraduate academic offering.
“The number of pre-registrations for this year 2025 also means the validation and appreciation of the public university by society, perhaps at the most necessary time. It highlights the effort of a community that, in very complex contexts, and despite substantial reductions in budgets for works, operations and salaries, committed itself to promoting these reforms and sustaining them. But it also supports the challenge that this administration means to invest in the implementation of new courses each year. With everything that it means to undertake the construction of study plans, to cover the requirements of the field of science and production, to include new technologies, and to guarantee the effective fulfillment that implies receiving more students for whom teachers, classrooms, buildings and technology are needed,” said Bartolacci.
Shorter, more chosen
It is a common denominator in each ExpoCarrera organized by the UNR or other fairs to display the academic offer to hear the unanimous request of the new generations who demand short degrees. The new paths that have been added in recent years have in common that they last four years. In 2023, promoted by the current administration, the Superior Council of the UNR approved the regulations for undergraduate degrees to be shorter and to promote the modernization of the study programs, with the aim of adapting the UNR to global contexts in permanent change.
Thus, the minimum number of hours required by the national system or the respective accreditation bodies was taken by the UNR as the maximum possible amount, which made it the first Public University to implement this transformation in the academic training paths. For the new degrees, the total hourly load of the study plan will not exceed the minimum established by national regulations or by the standards defined by national or regional accreditation institutions. The challenge is to be able to move forward in shortening the extensions of the rest of the degree courses, a process underway in the current plan reforms. But the modernization proposed by the UNR was not limited to the hourly load, but to the work on the superposition of content and the incorporation of more practical training and hybrid courses, with subjects that are taught entirely virtually. For example, Citizen Security, one of the new degrees, is the first with half of face-to-face and half virtual courses, and something similar happens with Data Science, which begins to be taught this year, which incorporates virtual subjects. "The reforms that we promoted in recent years began to bear fruit. This record number of students enrolled is not a coincidence, it is the result of having encouraged us to change profoundly, of having driven with great effort the launching of new courses. Never before in such a short time have so many new courses been created, and the result is there for all to see, we have the highest enrollment in the entire history of the UNR,” said Rector Franco Bartolacci.
College dream
Traditional careers continue to be the choice of thousands of students who approach the Public University full of dreams with the intention of becoming future professionals. For 2025, there are 3046 enrolled in Medicine, 1744 enrolled in Nursing, 2924 in Economic Sciences, 2098 in Psychology, 1548 in Law and 1002 in Architecture. The varied proposals of the Faculty of Humanities add up to a total of 3133 new students.
Journalist: Micaela Pereyra / Photographer: Camila Casero