From coming September onwards, the Municipality plans to offer a five week Swedish course to non-swedish students. A green light from the University is the last step before heading off.
Komvux, the organization for Adult Education at Lund’s University made the first plans for the five-week course earlier this spring and is now finalizing the details.
“We will have classes twice a week, on Tuesdays and Thursdays, but we won’t only meet in the classroom,” Björn Elias, the Principal of Adult Education tells.
“Once, we will take the students to open-air museum Kulturen and another time we will make a walk in the center, to give an introduction to Swedish culture and history.”
In the past, students were not always satisfied with courses offered to them, as student-SFI (Swedish for Immigrants) courses were cancelled and students ended up either in too intensive courses or on waiting lists. Therefore, Komvux has consulted the University for input. Lund University in its turn asked students that had been in SFI before to suggest how the new course could be constructed.
In the short period of five weeks, the students can obviously not reach a very high level in Swedish.
“It is meant to make students get used to hear Swedish. They will also be able to say most simple sentences, as introducing themselves and ordering something in a restaurant”, says Björn Elias.
However, those students with an interest of taking their Swedish further are welcome to continue with regular SFI.
“We will then try to keep the group of interested master students together, so that we can continue with them on the right level and with two-weekly classes,” Björn Elias adds.
Students can only apply for the course if they have a personal number, which is allotted by the Tax Office. Björn Elias admits that this could form a problem, as requesting a personal number sometimes takes several weeks.
“Hopefully, this will work out. We will ask the Tax office to hurry up with providing personal numbers. We hope then to start mid-September with the first groups.”
The plans as they now lie on the table are ‘almost ready’. Komvux currently waits for green light from the University, after which they will spread information among the students that arrive in August.
