Progress report for higher education for 2015 was released today. The report shows that Norwegian students are still struggling to complete their studies on time at all levels from bachelor to PhD, writes NRK.
Minority of Norwegian students manage to complete their studies in the prescribed time. Only 40 percent of of bachelor students manages to complete their studies on time, while this number among graduate students is 43 percent.
PhD students demonstrate a little bit better performance with 66 percent of completion rate.
Talking to NRK, Education Minister Torbjørn Røe Isaksen thinks this is a symptom of poor quality in Norwegian higher education.
Isaksen believes the low completion and the high dropout rate are two symptoms that Norway has a quality challenge in higher education. It is costly for our society and for the individual student, says he.
Private Universities Are Not Better
The report shows that percentage of completion among bacheloer students was highest in Arts and Design Academy in Bergen (KHiB) with 83.5 percent. On the other hand the students at the private School of Management and Technology (HLT) had the lowest rate with 10.1 percent.
Another private university BI has the master students with the completion rates as low as 2.2 percent.
Among public universities, NTNU has the best completion rate at the master with 57.9 percent, while the University of Tromsø has the lowest with 37.3 percent.
University of Bergen is clearly the best of the five largest PhD rewarding institutions, with a rate of completion within six years at 77 percent.