International Student Forum/ Message Board

Are there tuition fees at Swedish universities and university colleges?

With rare exceptions, all tuition fees in higher education in Sweden are subsidized by the government. This applies to foreign as well as Swedish students. Higher education is fully financed by the state, a system common to many European countries. You will still have to cover living expenses and pay student union fees, though.

The number of international students in Sweden has been growing rapidly, primarily due to two factors. First, because Sweden is so committed to universal English in its population, there are lots of academic offerings in English. International students can find English language programs in all of the most popular disciplines -- which include social sciences, business or law (34.8 % of international student in Sweden); engineering, manufacturing and construction (17.9%); humanities and arts (17.6%); sciences (12.4%); health and welfare (9.1%); and education (4.8%). The number of international students in Sweden has now surpassed 36,000.

Second, international students pay no tuition!! Just like Swedish students, international students admitted to Swedish undergraduate or masters programs can attend without paying any tuition. This is reflective of an overall commitment to higher education -- Sweden ranked third in spending worldwide on tertiary education at 2.2% of GDP, behind only Denmark and Norway.

For more information on the increasing number of international students in Sweden, read the whole article from StudyinSweden.se here.

However, this great deal is being threatened. Sweden has proposed charging tuition to all international students except those from EU countries. This week, Swedish universities and unions went on the record to object to the government proposal . Academics are concerned that proposals to introduce tuition fees for international students at Sweden’s universities could discourage gifted foreign students from coming to study in Sweden.

To find out more, you can read the entire article from The Local here. Lets hope that Sweden maintains its commitment to international education, as any affordable international education program, no matter how few spots are available, provides hope and opportunity to students that couldn't otherwise afford to go abroad.

An official report on the issue was commissioned by the last government from former Swedish Institute director Erland Ringborg and presented in January. It recommended that all students coming to Sweden from outside the European Economic Area should pay for the cost of their education. All undergraduate and Masters students in Sweden currently have their costs paid by the Swedish state, regardless of their nationality.

But in submissions presented to the department of education on Thursday, universities and unions argued that fees could dissuade foreign students from coming to Sweden, a situation which they say could leave many colleges with gaps in their budgets and which would deprive Swedish institutions of valuable foreign talent.

The Swedish National Agency for Higher Education said it remained against all tuition fees in Swedish universities.

Anders Flodström, president of the Royal Insitute of Technology (KTH) in Stockholm was cautious about the plans.

“I think we would prefer a tuition fee system - for Swedish students as well in the long run – but a tuition fee system has to be accompanied by stipends and scholarships. We don’t see such a system being put forward at present.”

Flodström said that KTH was expecting over 2,000 non-European students next year, but said that tuition fees would “definitely put them off coming” if there was no scholarship system.

“If this was the case, they would go to places like Imperial [in London] and MIT [Massachussetts Institute of Technology] instead.”

He said that while industry sponsors PhD students at KTH, the only realistic source of sponsorship for undergraduates and Masters students was the government.

“There would be an economic loss in our case of around 70 million kronor per year if we were not compensated,” he said.

“More seriously, there would be a drop in quality – we get some excellent students from non-European countries.”

Juan Juan,

Good luck - let us know what you find out!

Cheers

Hello,

In response to your questions regarding tuition fees, we can inform you that the term foreign students includes students from outside the EU.

The rare exceptions we refer to are certain private educational institutions that charge tuition fees. These institutions are, however, often highly specialized and they might not always offer English-language courses. Furthermore, many institutions of higher education offer what is known as contract training – you can read more about it via this link: http://www.studyinsweden.se/templates/c ... _4973.aspx. Hopefully we have been able to answer your questions.

Sincerely
Axel Christensson
Swedish Institute