By Eternity Uwaifo
On May 27th, 2021, Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen publicised the initiative ‘Closer To: More education and strong communities’ at Aarhus University.
The plan aimed to strengthen the link between rural and urban areas with the hope of better communities and a more accessible labour market.
Cities such as Odense, Aalborg, Copenhagen and Aarhus were to reduce their campuses by 5-10%. Arts, humanities, religious studies, and veterinary sciences were some of the programmes relocated.
The plan was to take place over five years, phasing in from the 2022/23 academic year.
“We were yelling, the universities were yelling, the big companies were yelling, stop and think about this,” says Julie Lindmann, the president of DSF, a national union for students.
In 2021 students mourned the loss of study places, wearing dark clothes, holding an urn. Student protests could be heard for days outside the Higher Education and Science Ministry building. But, it’s the actions taken inside which will have a lasting impact.
2022, small cities Esbjerg, Herning and Foulum will see incoming students travel to pursue their studies.
“I think you will see an impact when you start opening to bigger [groups of] students, for example, in Foulum, outside of Aarhus, there’s no study environment, and there’s going to be a new class that goes there. That’s when you’ll see a big impact,” says Julie.
The importance of student life in Denmark is one of the focal points against the plan.
“We can’t live without students”, says Janus Preiss, Head of Communications at Studenterhus Aarhus.
“We have around 100 volunteers, sometimes 150, working throughout the years, making events, working behind bars, [working] downstairs as our student helpers”, he adds.
Aarhus, Denmark’s youngest city, owes a sixth of its population to students. Shops, cafes, restaurants, and bars pack tightly along the canal in the city centre, where bike paths along the pavement segregate cyclists from pedestrians.
Although housing 340,000 people, the city has evolved into a stronghold for students.
“We need to acknowledge that being a student is not only sitting and having class but having student activities, student jobs, student housing and cultural lives as well as good bike paths. These cities they’re centred around young people.
“The cities that are now going to take students need to be ambitious about how they will do city planning in the future. A lot of mayors have welcomed students, but we hope they will take their jobs seriously and create cities where it’s possible for students to live,” says Julie.
While the courses are identical, the opportunities surrounding them could not be more different. “You won’t have the same opportunities if you go to Esbjerg or other parts of Western Jutland”, admits Dr Roger Buch, a professor in political science at the Danish School of Media and Journalism.
The ask on teachers also reaches a new high as small institutions such as DMJX face cutting programmes or asking teachers to commute during their working hours.
“If teachers are going to drive from this school to other parts of Jutland, they will spend their working hours on driving, and therefore teach less courses,” explains Dr Buch. Talking about the new form education could take in certain places within Denmark.
Part of being a student is being able to walk down the hall and pop into your professor’s office. I’m afraid that people studying in small cities [will] have a lot of online education, or professors being there and hurrying home after teaching,” says Julie.
Students vying for places at popular universities will compound the pressure placed on GPA, with some opting out or deferring to get on their preferred course of study.
DMJX
“I think we’ll see people changing a bit more, and there’ll be more [people] dropping out and starting something new. I think the studies we move out might become smaller.
“I hope this will be a great success, but I’m afraid this was simply too much of a move, and we will have a lot of empty education centres outside the city,” stresses Julie.
Photos:
Eternity Uwaifo
