Right, so we all know that finding housing in Stockholm is a pain in the ass even for the employed native. I’m not employed and I’m not a native, so of course I’m struggling to find a place to live after my current lease expires in June. It’s not just me. Many of us international students are in similar positions. SSSB.se is there to help us, right? Not really.
Take this hypothetical. A Swedish student – let’s call him Anders – graduates from secondary school, gynmasiet, and immediately signs up on a student-housing queue in Stockholm. A foreign student – let’s call her Mary – applies to SU in the winter for admission the following fall, and while she applied to the university, she signs up on the same housing queue as Anders. Well, Anders doesn’t go straight from gymnasiet to university, like many Swedish students: he travels for a bit, or maybe he works a job or two, taking probably an entire school year. By the time Anders applies and is accepted to SU, he’s got well over a year in credit days on his queue (i.e. from his June graduation until his admission for the August of the following year, approximately 15 months). Well, by the time Mary is accepted to SU and arrives in Stockholm, she’ll have only 8 or 9 months of credit days, for the time elapsed between her winter application and autumn admission would be, say, December to August. Both Mary and Anders are equally qualified students and are both afforded the right to live and study in Sweden – Anders by being a Swedish citizen, Mary by earning admission to SU and by being granted a student visa by Migrationsverket – but only one is likely to find student housing.
Does this make any sense?
Sure, SSSB has just announced that only those registered with a student union can queue on its list, limiting Anders and putting him on the same playing field as Mary. But the policy is not retroactive, meaning that Anders’s friend – let’s call him Johan, who began queuing right after high school, took three years off, and is now beginning studies at SU – will have over one thousand SSSB credit days while Mary – and, for that matter, Anders – are still at the bottom of the list. All three began their studies at the same time, all three proved student union membership at the same time, but only one is likely to find student housing.
Does this make any sense?
Andreas Kidane, Representative
Makes perfectly sense for me. The waiting list gives everyone the same possibility to get a room. I think it would be unfair if ‘Mary’ would get a room before the others who waited longer. Mary had the same chances and could have planned her abroad studies earlier. Ok, it’s probably easier for Swedes to find a flat in Sweden, but it wouldn’t be fair to advantage foreign students over Swedish.
ReplyDeleteThis doesn’t mean that the housing situation here doesn’t suck. I also applied at the housing office for a room shortly after I got accepted for an ERASMUS year, and what a surprise, didn’t get a room! The housing office placing system is here more complicated, think it was about 200 from 400 exchangees who didn’t get housing. So should SU then just allow as many exchange students as they have free student accommodation? I don’t think so. Even though it was hard and annoying and also seemed hopeless after some time, I found a room, although pretty far out and with a crazy landlord. But without SU accepting more exchange students than they can accommodate, I would have had this awesome possibility to study here for 2 semesters and missed out on heaps!
Sven, Cool that you eventually found a place to live. It's a shame that it couldn't be at a student accommodation, isn't it?
ReplyDeleteSure, it wouldn't be fair to advantage foreign students over others. But it's also not fair to leave foreign students at a stark disadvantage. By getting accepted to a Swedish university and/or by being granted a student visa to study in the country, foreign students are guaranteed -- in theory -- the same student provisions as other fellow students. But when foreign students have to compete for a necessity that they have little or no chance of fairly competing for, that's a problem for all students, foreign or otherwise. Remember, this isn't just a problem for foreign students; it's a problem for all new local students, too.
I agree with Sven and disagree with Andreas. Andreas - look around - there are over 80 per cent exchange students at the student accommodations here in Stockholm - so why are they so discriminated?
ReplyDeleteIt does not make sense at all. The question is why does SU accept students when it does not have the infrastructure to deliver high quality education as is obtained elsewhere and end up putting foreign students in excruciating and argonizing accommodation experiences? Sweden is not under any pressure to accept foreign students and it must accept students based on the knowledge that students won't sleep in tents and at train station when they arrive.
ReplyDeleteMubashar: first of all, exchange students are only a portion of all international students at SU and in Stockholm, so high accommodation rates for them does not mean high accommodation rates for all foreign students.
ReplyDeleteSecondly, exchange students are assisted by the university in their search for housing, and though it's not guaranteed to all of them, it's provided for only about half of them.
Finally, your 80 per cent number seems to be a bit off. SU declares that "there are around 450 exchange students studying at Stockholm University," and KTH declares to have about 1,500. Let's add these two numbers and round them up to 2,000. SSSB alone offers around 8,000 housing units to Stockholm residents -- and that's just SSSB. Let's now assume that the average SSSB unit houses an average of 1.5 students -- a very conservative estimate, as some are one-person corridor rooms and some can house two, three or four students. These numbers mean that approximately -- and conservatively -- SSSB can house 12,000 students. If SSSB can house 12,000 students but there are only 2,000 exchange students in Stockholm, how can 80 per cent of Stockholm student housing residents be exchange students?
SU exchange student numbers:
http://www.su.se/english/about/news-and-events/more-housing-for-exchange-students-1.1910
KTH exchange student numbers:
http://www.kth.se/en/studies/exchange/exchange-students-at-kth-1.6519)
SSSB capacity numbers:(http://www.studyinstockholm.se/Accommodation/Accomodationagencies/StiftelsenStockholmsStudentbost%C3%A4derSSSB.aspx)
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