University of Copenhagen admissions rules have changed days before Denmark’s quota 1 deadline, leaving some applicants who were ill during their final upper-secondary exams unable to start their chosen bachelor’s programme this year.
The change affects applicants to the University of Copenhagen (Københavns Universitet, KU) who will only receive their final exam certificate after 5 July at 12:00 because they must take a sickness exam (sygeeksamen) in August. Until recently, according to a petition launched by affected applicants, KU’s guidance indicated that students in this situation could submit their certificate by 15 August.
KU now says this is no longer possible. Applicants who do not have their final certificate before the 5 July deadline cannot be admitted in this year’s bachelor intake and must apply again next year.
Copenhagen University admissions rule changes before the deadline
The dispute concerns Denmark’s centralised university admissions system and, in particular, quota 1 (kvote 1), the route through which applicants are assessed mainly on their upper-secondary school grade average.
KU’s current guidance states that it is not possible to complete the qualifying exam after 5 July at 12:00 when applying for admission to a bachelor’s programme at the university. Students who receive their certificate after that deadline because of a sickness exam “cannot be admitted” in the current intake and must instead apply the following year.
The decision has created uncertainty because the change came very close to the application deadline. A petition titled “Do not let documented illness cost students an entire study year” says affected applicants had planned their applications based on KU’s own previous guidance. The petition had 108 signatures on Saturday morning.
Its organisers argue that students should not bear the consequences of unclear or changed administrative practice. They are asking for a transition arrangement or dispensation for applicants who were documented as ill during their final exams.
Student representatives say equal access is at stake
The Danish Students’ Council (Danske Studerendes Fællesråd, DSF) has criticised the timing of the change. Linnea de Leon, a member of DSF’s executive committee, told TV 2 that the new practice puts applicants in an uncertain situation.
“It limits the possibility of free and equal access when it is changed at such short notice. That is definitely where the problem lies,” she said.
The criticism is not mainly directed at the legal principle behind the change, but at the way it has been introduced. For the affected students, the practical consequence may be the loss of a full study year, even if they pass their delayed exam and meet the academic requirements before the beginning of the academic year.
KU says the previous practice did not meet common rules
KU says it changed its admissions practice after the Danish Agency for Higher Education and Science (Uddannelses- og Forskningsstyrelsen) clarified how the common admission rules should be understood.
The issue concerns conditional admission. Under Danish rules, higher education institutions may decide whether they offer conditional admission to applicants who do not meet all requirements by the deadline. But if they do so, they must apply the principle consistently. They cannot offer conditional admission only to selected groups, such as students waiting for a sickness exam.
KU has therefore chosen not to offer conditional admission in these cases.
Rie Snekkerup, deputy director for KU Education (vicedirektør for KU Uddannelse), apologised in a written response to TV 2.
“We regret that the change has come so close to the application deadline, and we fully understand that it is experienced as both frustrating and unreasonable by the applicants who are affected,” she said.
“No one should be in any doubt that we are very sorry for the situation they are in,” she added.
Other Danish universities still allow sickness exam applicants
The University of Copenhagen’s approach differs from that of other Danish universities.
Aarhus University (Aarhus Universitet) tells applicants that they can still apply if they must take a sickness exam in August, provided they apply by 5 July at 12:00 and upload documentation showing that they are registered for the exam. If admitted, they must later submit their final certificate.
The University of Southern Denmark (Syddansk Universitet, SDU) also allows applicants waiting for a sickness exam to apply. SDU says admission is conditional on passing the qualifying exam, and applicants must send the final certificate after the sickness exam, no later than 31 August.
This difference has made the KU decision more controversial. The rules are national, but institutions retain discretion on whether to use conditional admission. The result is that students in similar circumstances may face different outcomes depending on which university they applied to.
