Student loans in Denmark

Student loans in Denmark are administered by the “Danish State Educational Grant and Loan Scheme Agency”, a Danish government agency.

These universal grants, are called SU (Statens Uddannelsesstøtte). State Educational Support. There are two different kinds.

There are grants for students attending secondary and tertiary school.

Secondary school grants

All students above age 18 are entitled to a free grant regulated partly by the income of their parents if they are below age 20. The basic rate for students living on their own and older than 20 is 5,174 DKK (about $1,020) a month.

University grants

When a student starts at a university or other another kind of Higher education they are entitled to SU for a maximum of six years. As all university education, with the exception of medicine takes five years in Denmark it allowed the student to take one year more on their studies than nominated, or to change their major during their first year without economic consequences.

Disability grants

At any higher education students with a permanent disability, such as muscular dystrophy, blindness, deafness or autism, can apply for an additional grant of 7.656 DKK (about US$1,322) a month, if they been professionally diagnosed.

Student loans

If needed, the student may supplement this with a student loan of 2,649 DKK (about US$522) that has to be repaid when the student has completed his or her education. Thus a student will normally receive about 61,124 DKK (about US$12,240) a year in grants with an optional 31,788 DKK (about US$6,264) in loans, making a total of 92,923 DKK (about US$18,314).

The governmentally granted SU loans have to be repaid once a student has graduated. However, any part of the loan that has not been repaid after 15 years does not have to be repaid.

Tuition

All education in Denmark ranging from primary school, the Danish equivalent of High School Gymnasiums as well as Universities and all other officially recognised forms of Higher education are completely free of charge.

Post-tertiary education

Students at doctoral level (Ph.D. or similar) are not really considered students, and thus they don't receive a student grant. However, most Ph.D. candidates are employed by universities as researchers, and thus receive a fixed salary. The annual salary may be around 318,000 DKK (about USD 54,200).