Exchange students lose Norwegian classes
A huge increase in the number of foreign students admitted to the University of Oslo leads to students no longer getting the Norwegian courses they are entitled to.
– The University increases the number of students, but fails to deliver on its promises. I don’t understand what they are up to, says Ricardo Duque, president of the International Student Union (ISU).
The reason for Duque’s confusion is that the University of Oslo (UiO) this semester admitted 200 foreign students more than previous semesters. As a result, the Department of Linguistics and Scandinavian Studies (ILN) lacks both the funds and qualified teachers to provide enough classes. In sum, the ILN needs to fill five additional positions.
– The UiO administration are just fooling themselves in admitting this many students. They close their eyes and hope for the best, Duque says.
In Duque’s opinion, the UiO admitting this many international students is a good thing. However, he’s negative to the administration’s lacking considerations of the consequences.
– Many of the international students come to Norway partly out of a desire to learn Norwegian, and it’s a cause of concern that they aren’t allowed to take this class. It’s an embarrassment for the University that students’ expectations aren’t met, Duque says.
The leadership at the Faculty of Humanities perceives the situation to be acute.
– We’re screaming for resources. We sincerely want to provide this offer to the students, Per Thomas Andersen, acting head of the ILN, says.
According to Andersen, students stand in line for hours on end, and as a result don’t gett he education they are entitled to. He’s not pleased with the fact that the University’s central administration failed to notify the ILN of the exchange student boom, particularly because the students are entitled to the class.
– The University must understand that this is a service for foreign students, and that the UiO has to provide full financing to fill the needs. The resource shortfall must be solved, Andersen says.
– The UiO ought to launch an internal evaluation of just how many foreign students they have the capacity to handle, Duque suggests.
System failure
UiO studies director Monica Bakken does not agree that the administration has ignored the problem, but admits that the system has failed.
– We failed to give a sufficiently clear message concerning how many students were to attend the class, Bakken says.
Bakken feels that the ambition to increase the number of international students at the University increases the need for Norwegian classes, and realizes that the situation needs rectification. She is aware that Norwegian classes are a necessary prerequisite for the admissions granted.
– But when can we expect that the situation is solved?
– It’s not granted that we’ll be able to find teachers for all the students, and no matter what, not everybody will be admitted. Some course places may be freed through dropouts and so on, but how many who’ll be left without an offer in the end, we don’t know.
– Will this be a priority in future budgets?
– Norwegian courses will be of high priority in coming plans, but this presupposes that money is set aside for this purpose, Bakken says.
