Termination of a Study Agreement Does Not Automatically End the Student’s Public-Law Status
The judgment of the Supreme Administrative Court of the Slovak Republic, file no. 8 Svk 13/2023 of 30.04.2025, is an important contribution to the interpretation of the legal position of a university student following the annulment of a decision on expulsion from studies. The core issue was what legal consequences follow from the annulment of a previous decision on expulsion and how a university should address a subsequent unilateral act of the student, namely withdrawal from an agreement on the provision of university studies for a foreign student.
The Supreme Administrative Court of the Slovak Republic proceeded from the premise that, once a decision on expulsion from studies is annulled, the public-law relationship between the university and the student is restored. University studies constitute a public-law relationship which arises upon a decision on admission to studies and may cease only in the manners provided for by Act No. 131/2002 Coll. on Higher Education and on amendments and supplements to certain acts, as amended. Such a relationship therefore cannot be terminated outside the statutory framework, including by a mere conclusion that a private-law agreement existing alongside that public-law relationship has ceased to exist.
A key legal aspect of the judgment is the distinction between two parallel legal relationships. On the one hand, there is the student’s public-law status, governed by Act No. 131/2002 Coll. on Higher Education and on amendments and supplements to certain acts, as amended, and by the internal regulations of the university. On the other hand, there is a private-law contractual relationship established by the agreement on the provision of university studies for a foreign student, concluded pursuant to § 51 of Act No. 40/1964 Coll., the Civil Code. The Supreme Administrative Court of the Slovak Republic emphasised that any termination of that agreement by withdrawal does not automatically result in the termination of studies as a public-law relationship. Studies may be completed only in the ordinary manner pursuant to § 65 of Act No. 131/2002 Coll. on Higher Education and on amendments and supplements to certain acts, as amended, or otherwise pursuant to § 66 of the same act.
That conclusion does not mean, however, that a university may disregard a unilateral act of the student in proceedings concerning expulsion from studies. On the contrary, the Supreme Administrative Court of the Slovak Republic considered it essential that, in the second decision on expulsion, the defendant did not address at all the student’s withdrawal from the agreement, which had been delivered to it on 23.09.2019. The university was required to assess whether that act could have any effects in relation to the student’s public-law status, in particular whether it could not be materially assessed as abandonment of studies under § 66(1)(a) of Act No. 131/2002 Coll. On Higher Education and on amendments and supplements to certain acts, as amended. If the act amounted to abandonment of studies, the studies would, pursuant to § 66(2)(a) of that act, have ended on the day on which the written declaration was delivered to the university, and a subsequent decision on expulsion would no longer have had any subject matter.
The judgment is also significant from a procedural perspective. The Supreme Administrative Court of the Slovak Republic recalled that, although under § 108(1) of Act No. 131/2002 Coll. on Higher Education and on amendments and supplements to certain acts, as amended, Act No. 71/1967 Coll. on Administrative Proceedings (Administrative Procedure Code), as amended, generally does not apply to decision-making under that act, a decision on expulsion from studies must nevertheless be duly, logically and reviewably reasoned. A public administration authority must clearly explain the considerations by which it was guided, the facts it took into account and the manner in which it legally assessed them. Where a university omits an act of a student that may be significant for assessing that student’s legal status, such omission renders the reasoning insufficient and the decision unreviewable.
At the same time, the Supreme Administrative Court of the Slovak Republic corrected the conclusion of the administrative court that the withdrawal from the agreement itself meant that the claimant ceased to be a student. It considered that conclusion incorrect, since the termination of a private-law obligation cannot, without more, be equated with the termination of university studies as a public-law relationship. Nevertheless, the Supreme Administrative Court of the Slovak Republic dismissed the defendant’s cassation complaint, since the judgment of the administrative court annulling the second decision on expulsion was ultimately correct on the merits, even though the administrative court had incorrectly assessed the effects of the withdrawal from the agreement. The practical consequence of the judgment is that, in the subsequent proceedings, the university must expressly assess the legal significance of the withdrawal from the agreement, its possible impact on the public-law relationship between the university and the student, and only thereafter choose the lawful procedural course.
