The number of international students coming to the Capital Region of Denmark increased by nearly 50 percent over a decade, with 2,500 international students coming in 2012 and 3,700 in 2022, according to new figures published by Copenhagen Municipality.
In the rest of Denmark, however, the intake of international students fell by around 40 percent, dropping from 3,900 in 2012 to just 2,300 in 2022.
The statisticians behind the report linked this to previous governments' decision to cut the number of English-language courses in 2017, 2018 and 2022.
VIA University College, which runs eight campuses across Jutland, went from educating the most international students in Denmark in 2012, with 691 students, to only ranking seventh in 2022, with 274 students.
At the same time, the number of international students at the DTU Technical University of Denmark, University of Copenhagen and Copenhagen Business School nearly doubled, going from 691 to 1,122, 601 to 1,046, and 562 to 872 respectively.
The situation on international courses has improved since 2022, however. The government in October last year announced that it planned to create 400 more places on science, technology, engineering and maths degrees taught in English, to cut the bill for tuition.
On its website, VIA now reports having more than 1,000 international students studying one of its nine English-language courses.
Another change over the period 2012-2022 was the significant increase in the proportion of international students in the Copenhagen area who had a part-time job during their studies, something that the statisticians behind the report say may help keep students in the country after they graduate.
In 2012, three out of five international students in the Copenhagen area had a job during their time studying. By 2022, this had increased to three out of four international students.
The international students who came in 2022 most often got their first jobs in hotels and restaurants (27 percent), education (19 percent), or travel agents or cleaning (11 percent).
They worked an average of 15 hours a week on their side jobs and were employed for just over seven months of each year in which they were studying.
International students on vocational education programmes worked on average 24 hours per week for 8.5 months per year, whereas students doing a standard bachelor degree with a side job worked an average of 12 hours per week for 6.4 months per year.
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