Technical College Will Turn Away Hundreds Of Students

The Technical College and other vocational schools will have to turn away hundreds of students in upcoming terms, reports RÚV.

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The interest in technical and vocational schools has increased significantly in the last few years. The Technical School alone had to turn away 700 students last year. The Akureyri Vocational School, the South Iceland College of Education, and the Borgarholts School have faced similar problems.

“I don’t know how many [we will have to reject], but I think I can say it will be less,” says director of the Technical College, Hildur Ingvarsdóttir. “On the one hand, we have a slightly lower number of applications, mainly from older students, and on the the other hand, we are also looking for ways to place as many as we can this autumn. We will have to reject some hundreds, but not 700, I think I can say that.”

Funding shortages, unaffordable housing, and teacher shortages are causing schools to have to turn away new students.

“The task is to make sure that as many people as possible can go into apprenticeships. It is positive that many people are interested in the programme,” says the Minister of Education, Ásmundur Einar Daðason.

“We need to look at where we’re going, where we’re going to be in 10 years, how many people we want to go to this school. How many are we going to graduate? So how are we going to allocate resources within the system? Maybe we need to look at our entire educational system,” says Hildur.