Undergraduate education

Undergraduate education is education conducted after secondary education and before postgraduate education. It typically includes all postsecondary programs up to the level of a bachelor's degree. For example, in the United States, a student pursuing an associate or bachelor's degree is known as an undergraduate student while a student who is pursuing a higher degree (masters, doctorate) is a graduate student. Upon completion of courses and other requirements of an undergraduate program, the student would earn the corresponding degree. In some other educational systems, undergraduate education is postsecondary education up to and including the level of a master's degree; this is the case for some science courses in Britain and some medicine courses in Europe.

By country

Brazil

Brazil follows the major traits of the continental European system; free public schools are available from kindergarten up to postgraduation, both as a right established in Article 6, caput of the Brazilian Constitution and as a duty of the State in Article 208, Items I, IV and V, of the Brazilian Constitution. Students choose their specific course of studies before joining the university. Admission to university is obtained by means of a competitive entrance exam known as Vestibular (a concept somewhat similar to the Baccalauréat in France). A later system introduced in 2009, adopted by most federal universities, uses the high school national examination (ENEM) result as part or a replacement of the Vestibular grade. Depending on the chosen course, upon graduating the student is granted: a technologist diploma, three years to complete, a bachelor's degree's diploma, which usually takes four or, in the case of Law, Veterinary, Geology and Engineering, five years to complete; or a professional diploma, which normally require five or, in the case of medicine, six years to complete.