Scan Magazine | Special Theme | Danish Education Special - Efterskoler
SKALs Efterskole focuses on giving pupils the social and academic skills needed to move in, and understand, different cultures.
Become a global citizen With four out of seven classes focused on international studies, SKALs Efterskole (SKAL’s International Boarding School) enables Danish and international students to acquire skills and qualifications essential to becoming global citizens. Offering the International General Certificate of Secondary Education (IGCSE), the school is in the top five of the best-performing schools in Denmark. By Signe Hansen | Photos: SKALs Efterskole
Founded in central Jutland in 1990, SKALs Efterskole was designed to provide an alternative to the many free Danish boarding schools focused predominantly on personal development and social interaction. SKALs’ founders wanted to combine these traditional ‘efterskole’ ideals with a more substantial preparation for its students’ continued professional and academic lives. This is an ambition that principal Nicolai Vangkilde Terp, who took over the post as head of the school in the beginning of 2018, shares. “It’s about combining the traditional ‘efterskole’ values with a more targeted academic ap84 | Issue 118 | November 2018
proach. Our school is a place where it’s okay to want to go to school, to like to go to school, and that’s a relief to many of our pupils; because being someone who wants to study and who wants to do good is unfortunately not cool in a lot of places today,” he explains. Of the 160 students enrolled annually at SKALs, more than 100 choose either the ninth or tenth-grade IGCSE class or the International Project class. All the international classes are taught in English, and, since all important messages are given in both Danish and English, it is
not a necessity to speak Danish to study at SKALs Efterskole.
An international set of skills The school’s IGCSE pupils finish with an exam approved by the University of Cambridge. The exam gives access to the International Baccalaureate (IB), which is offered by 14 Danish gymnasia as well as numerous educational institutions all over the world, and that means that not just Danish pupils are attracted to the course. “We have more and more pupils coming from abroad to take the IGCSE – for many, it’s a good alternative to the boarding schools in their home country, and for some, with one or two Danish parents, it’s a way to get introduced to the Danish school system and open up for the possibility of pursuing further studies in Denmark,” explains Terp. Furthermore, if pupils take the tenth-grade IGCSE, the exam may qualify them to