Never before have so many Norwegian students been studying abroad. Their most popular destination is Great Britain, where more than 4,000 young Norwegians are undertaking their entire higher education and another thousand are taking part of it.
All told, around 23,400 young Norwegians traveled out of Norway to pursue higher education. Fully 4,164 Norwegians are currently studying full-time in the UK, while 954 are on exchange programs or there for a semester or two.
Denmark has attracted the second-largest portion of students (3,155) and Poland the third-largest, at 1,478, according to new figures from Norway’s student financing agency Lånekassen.
Newspaper Aftenposten reported this week that the Association of Norwegian Students Abroad (ANSA) links the growth to overall growth in the student population. The strong Norwegian currency has helped make tuition fees less daunting, but ANSA thinks studying abroad, especially in the US, has become so expensive that many who’d like to do so can’t afford it, even with student loans and stipends of up to NOK 116,000 per year (USD 19,300) offered by the Norwegian state.
Most medical students who travel abroad are studying in Poland, Hungary, Slovakia and the Czech Republic. The US attracts the most students who go abroad for limited periods. Around 14,200 Norwegians earned bachelor’s degrees abroad last year, while 9,100 are working on master’s degrees.
Views and News staff
