History students held back by lack of languages

Many history students at Stockholm University do not have sufficient Swedish or English language skills to study basic-level history, an evaluation has found.

An assessment of the first three basic courses in history at the university said that an increasing proportion of students did not read or write well enough to be enrolled in the programme. As a result, history lecturers have had to teach Swedish and English at high-school level to their students, the Svenska Dagbladet reported on 24 July.

Paul Sjöblom, assistant professor of history at Stockholm University, told the newspaper that he thought students’ general skillsets had been deteriorating consistently for at least a decade.