School of Gastronomy and Hotel Services in Bratislava (SOŠ gastronómie a hotelových služieb)

Why students choose it

• Plenty of practice: training kitchens, a bakery, a confectionery and a meat workshop on site, plus placements in restaurants, hotels and food producers around Bratislava.
• A choice of length to match the student's goal: three years to a trade, four years with a vocational certificate, five years with a maturita and a qualification at once.
• With a maturita, graduates can apply to universities in Slovakia and elsewhere in the EU — tourism management or food technology, for example.
• The trades taught here are in demand across hospitality, so part-time work in the field during studies is realistic.
• Placements abroad and professional competitions — the school takes part in exchange programmes.
• Bratislava itself: easy transport, many employers and a sizeable Russian- and Ukrainian-speaking community nearby.

Faculties and programmes

How international students apply

Application deadlines

Applications go through the state ePrihláška system. For the 2026/2027 school year the first round ran from 8 to 20 February 2026, and the second round — if places were left — from 3 to 8 June 2026. Entrance exams for non-talent programmes are held in May, and the school publishes results within a few days of the exam. Dates for 2027/2028 are announced in autumn, so check minedu.sk.

Entrance exams

• For maturita programmes (Hotel Academy, poradenstvo vo výžive) — a written test in Slovak language and mathematics at lower-secondary level.
• For the three-year vocational programmes schools often admit on school grades, with no written exam; the exact criteria are published before applications open.
• The exam is taken in Slovak, so the language is worth building up in advance — B1–B2 is the usual reference point.

Documents

• the ePrihláška application (filed by the current school or by a parent);
• the certificate of completed 9th grade and recent school reports, with an official translation into Slovak;
• a recognition decision from the Regional Office of School Administration (Regionálny úrad školskej správy) — or proof that the request has been filed;
• proof of the child's legal stay in Slovakia — a residence permit or the application for one;
• a medical certificate of fitness for the chosen trade if the school asks for one (a food-handler's health record for catering programmes).

Applying after 9th grade works differently from applying to a university: the application is filed in winter, and document recognition is best started six months ahead. The whole route is set out on the admission after 9th grade page, and the recognition procedure in the article on nostrification. We take on choosing the school, the translations and the filing — see turnkey admission.

Application deadlines from minedu.sk for 2026/2027; admission criteria from the school website farskeho.sk, August 2026. Check the current academic year before applying.

Dormitory and costs

Public sources do not show a boarding house of the school's own: students from other towns usually live in the school dormitories run by the Bratislava Self-Governing Region, which take in secondary-school students from across the city. A place costs roughly 30–60 € per month plus meals (indicative, 2026 — check with the specific dormitory). The application is filed after admission, in spring or early summer.

Some families rent a flat or a room near the school instead — you can estimate a year's budget in the cost calculator.

Choosing between three, four and five years

The difference is not only in length. Programmes ending with a maturita open the door to university; shorter programmes get the student into work faster, but higher education then requires a follow-up course (nadstavbové štúdium) — two more years after the výučný list.

Slovak and settling in

Teaching and the entrance test are in Slovak. Vocational subjects lean heavily on terminology, so the language is best started a year before applying, in parallel with preparing documents.

• B1–B2 is the usual reference point for comfortable study; in practice a lot is picked up at school itself.
• The hardest part in the first months is trade vocabulary and technical recipe cards — dictionaries and older students help.
• Neighbouring options in the catalogue: the hairdressing and make-up school in Bratislava and the medical school in Nitra.

FAQ