Regional universities hit hardest as Danish applications drop 11 per cent

Lingering fears over Covid and difficulties accessing extracurricular opportunities while studying have been blamed for a steep drop in university applications in Denmark, with younger, regional universities bearing the brunt of the decrease.

Recently released data showed that the first wave of applications in July were 11 per cent lower than at the same point in 2020 – when 46,441 students applied – with those hoping for a place favouring universities in some of the country’s bigger cities.

Roskilde University, in a town of about 50,000 people, has seen applications drop by 21 per cent compared with last year, whereas at the University of Copenhagen they have fallen by 10 per cent.

Rie Snekkerup, vice-provost for education at Copenhagen and deputy chair of the education group at Universities Denmark, said that there were “huge differences” between institutions. “The universities outside the big cities have dropped a lot more,” she noted.

The results may be difficult reading for the Danish government, which is in the middle of a controversial regional education push designed to boost course growth outside major cities.

Education minister Jesper Petersen said that the overall decline was explained by “generation lockdown taking a break from books”, while the deputy director of the Danish Agency for Education and Research, Mikkel Leihardt, pointed to better opportunities for work and travel now Covid restrictions have been eased.

Hanne Leth Andersen, rector of Roskilde University, said that “in the wake of the corona crisis, students tend to want the traditional study programmes and also to choose the big cities”.

That was echoed by Laura Louise Sarauw, part of the critical university studies research group at Roskilde, who agreed that the typical profile of a Roskilde versus a Copenhagen student helped explain the difference.

“They’re more experimental with their lives, they have not decided in advance their educational direction. They’re more open to doing other things than enrolling in an educational programme in the years after secondary education,” she told Times Higher Education, referring to Roskilde’s students.

She said that while both groups were mixed in terms of background and aspirations, students wanting to go to institutions such as Copenhagen tend to have more fixed career ambitions and favour courses such as medicine, which are primarily offered in major cities.

With fears of further lockdowns this winter, Professor Sarauw said it was possible some students wanted a larger community around them, but that the big drops at institutions such as Roskilde were more likely driven by their students having more flexible life plans.

She said that massification had weakened the value of degrees in Denmark, leading more students to seek other experience to distinguish themselves to employers. Recent reforms that require students to progress through courses at a minimum pace mean gaining those skills is now harder after enrolment, she said.

“Once you have enrolled it’s very difficult for you to take an internship, have a really demanding study job, or do volunteer work, so students choose to take another gap year in order to gain those type of qualifications,” she said.

While the incoming caps on popular courses in major cities do not come into force until 2023, she added that students may be hesitant to apply for those earmarked for a squeeze.

Mr Petersen said he was particularly concerned about falling applications in courses that feed shortage professions, such as teaching and nursing, the latter of which has fallen by 32 per cent compared with 2019.

He blamed “a trend over time that dictates that the more academic an education is, the finer it is”, but Professor Sarauw said ongoing nurses’ strikes over working conditions were a more probable deterrent than the social esteem courses held.

ben.upton@timeshighereducation.com