The Law on Higher Education Establishments stipulates that Higher Educational(HE) Institutes can deliver academic and professional higher education programmes.
In Latvia, there is both state-financed and fee-paying higher education. In order to single out the most able students, whose studies are publicly financed, higher education institutions carry out a procedure of student selection.
A bachelor's degree is awarded after three or four years of study, while a master's degree is obtained on successful completion of a second phase of academic higher education, lasting one or two years. At the end of each academic study program, the student usually has to defend a diploma thesis (a bachelor's or master's thesis). …
