The Government appointed the Swedish Higher Education Authority (UKÄ) to conduct a monitoring exercise and reporting on the effects of the pandemics in higher education.  Recently, UKÄ received and additional assignment: to assess the effects of the covid-19 pandemic on widening access to higher education.  

In an interim report, UKÄ showed that, during the spring semester 2020, the dropouts have increased amongst students whose parents did not have a higher education degree, when compared with the previous year.  New data shows that a high proportion of students that started university in 2020, came from from highly educated homes. The social bias in recruitment thus appears to have intensified during the pandemic. To gain knowledge about how the pandemic affected the broadened recruitment to the university, UKÄ is now entrusted to continuously report on follow up results and submit the final conclusions until 1 December 2022.

More information: https://www.regeringen.se/pressmeddelanden/2021/07/pandemins-effekter-pa-breddad-rekrytering-till-hogre-utbildning-ska-foljas-upp/ 

Source:  Eurydice Unit Sweden