EXPENSIVE FOR EVERYTHING WITH THE EXCEPTION OF EXCLUSIVE EDUCATIONS

By Ben Hamilton

For many Brits in Denmark, sending their children to an international school is like jumping into a time machine

Excluding the free public ones, the cheapest international school in Copenhagen costs just 3,665 US dollars a year in fees, according to the International Schools Database, putting it on a par with the amount typically demanded by a British private school in the early 1980s.

Between 1991 and 2016, private school fees in Britain soared by 550 percent, far outstripping the 201 percent rise in the cost of living and 217 percent increase in average earnings.

This all means that Copenhagen offers an incredible loophole for Brits, and other internationals, who want their children to have a privileged education (perhaps similar to the one they had), but realistically cannot afford it in their homelands.

Special needs failure

School absenteeism is costing society dearly. However, it is not a truancy problem, rather a failure to properly accommodate children with special needs and disabilities, along with a growing tendency to exclude problematic children. Over 15,000 parents were forced to stay at home in 2021 – at a cost to society of 1.6 billion kroner in lost earnings, reports DR.

Made possible by the huge state subsidies given to nearly all schools, it is a curiosity about Copenhagen in direct contrast to the overall cost of living, which is extremely high.

In December 2022, Copenhagen was found to be the tenth most expensive city to live in, according to the annual Economist Intelligence Unit survey, and the 16th dearest for internationals in 2021, according to Mercer.

On average much cheaper

The International Schools Database ranks Copenhagen as the cheapest for international schools out of an assessment of 31 cities in Europe.

Only Valencia, Alicante, Berlin and Sofia were able to undercut the cheapest possible price of 3,665 US dollars a year, but Copenhagen’s median charge of 4,501 was over 1,500 cheaper than the next on the list, Valencia.

Fewer on kontanthjælp

Never before this century have so few children had parents who are kontanthjælp unemployment benefit recipients. A new Arbejderbevægelsens Erhvervsråd report confirmed that about 35,000 children had at least one parent on kontanthjælp in 2022. That’s half the number five years ago and the lowest figure in 22 years.

Copenhagen has an outlier that bucks the trend, however. The fees for Copenhagen International School, according to the report, are 18,999 dollars a year. Had the ranking been based on the most expensive price charged by a school, Copenhagen would have placed 20th.

“For the third year in a row Copenhagen remains the least expensive city for international education, despite its reputation as being a high-cost destination,” noted the report.

“While this may come as a surprise to some due to the Danish capital’s high cost of living, in fact the majority of public and private schools in Denmark receive state funding which keeps costs low.”

Additionally, Copenhagen is the 73rd cheapest city in the world, out of 76 surveyed.

Swiss schools the dearest Switzerland, meanwhile, was the most

In consultation with kids

The second season of stop motion animated series ‘John Dillermand’, the controversial Danish children’s TV program in which the main character has the longest penis in the world, has been made after consultation with children from the upper half of the targeted age bracket. Many praised the series for addressing and normalising body issues.

expensive country in Europe for international school fees, with Zurich, Lausanne-Vaud and Geneva filling the top three positions. Zurich’s median is six times higher than Copenhagen’s.

It’s almost amusing to note that Switzerland and Denmark are often neck and neck in ‘most expensive surveys’, but in this one are first and last. In August, Copenhagen beat Bern into second place in a survey ranking Europe’s most expensive capitals for espressos!

Of the bottom ten, four were cities located in Spain and three in Eastern Europe. The report is based on the price of educating six-year-olds, so fees for older children could be higher.

“To calculate the prices of international schools, we used the whole price of a full term for one six-year old child, excluding once-off costs such as enrollment fees, application fees etc and not including free schools,” it explained.

Classroom temperature criticism

Teachers in October criticised the decision to lower temperatures in schools to 19 degrees due to the energy crisis. A 2021 study revealed that around 40 percent of schools have no ventilation system or one that is not functional. The problem increases as temperatures drop and opening doors and windows becomes a problem when it is cold.

Qualified teacher shortage

There are growing concerns that the state’s public schools do not have enough qualified teachers at their disposal. Last year’s university teacher training admissions were down 11 percent compared to 2019.

According to Arbejderbevægelsens Erhvervsråd, only 60 percent of newly-qualified teachers are employed by the public schools five years after their graduation.