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2005:23 R

College programmes - a preliminary report for the spring of 2005

Cooperation on programmes offering an introduction to higher education, “college programmes", has been going on for almost three years. College programmes are intended mainly for those whose studies in the upper secondary school did not qualify them for admission to higher education. The programmes are normally organised so that participants spend two semesters studying the upper-secondary courses required for enrolment to higher education and at the same time getting a taste of what academic study is like.

The annual reports submitted by the higher education institutions for 2004 show that college programmes are relatively marginal phenomena in higher education in Sweden, in terms of the numbers of participants. Twenty institutions offering college programmes report a total of 400 successful participants in the academic year 2003-04.

Several of the institutions offering college programmes have been allocated specific funding for this purpose, either by the government or the Delegation on Recruitment.

The annual reports of about half of these higher education institutions contain comments on college programmes. In some cases reports have been submitted directly to the funding body. Five of the remaining ten report that they are currently expanding their college programmes, or making them permanent. Comments that reflect difficulties in offering these programmes deal with the resource intensive process of enrolment, the individual support required for the participants and, in some cases, difficulties in recruiting students.

In order to analyse the rate of transfer to higher education on completion of college programmes, examination was made of all those registered on some form of college programme during the autumn semester of 2002. This showed that two years after beginning a college programme, 55 per cent of the participants were still involved in some form of higher education.

Swedish National Agency for Higher Education  Visting address: Luntmakargatan 13  Box 7851, 103 99 Stockholm
Phone: 08-563 085 00  Fax: 08-563 085 50  Email: hsv@hsv.se