Secondary education in

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(in

Danish Danish may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to the country of Denmark People * A national or citizen of Denmark, also called a "Dane," see Demographics of Denmark * Culture of Denmark * Danish people or Danes, people with a Danish ance ...

: ''ungdomsuddannelse'', "youth education") usually takes two to four years and is attended by students between the ages of 15 and 19. Secondary education is not compulsory, but usually free of charge, and students have a wide range of programmes to choose from. Some education programmes are academically orientated, the most common being the '' Gymnasium''. Others are more practically orientated, training students for jobs such as

artisan An artisan (from french: artisan, it, artigiano) is a skilled craft worker who makes or creates material objects partly or entirely by hand. These objects may be functional or strictly decorative, for example furniture, decorative art ...

s or

clerk A clerk is a white-collar worker who conducts general office tasks, or a worker who performs similar sales-related tasks in a retail environment. The responsibilities of clerical workers commonly include record keeping, filing, staffing service c ...

s through a combination of instruction in

vocational school A vocational school is a type of educational institution, which, depending on the country, may refer to either secondary or post-secondary education designed to provide vocational education or technical skills required to complete the task ...

s and

apprenticeship Apprenticeship is a system for training a new generation of practitioners of a trade or profession with on-the-job training and often some accompanying study (classroom work and reading). Apprenticeships can also enable practitioners to gain a ...

Gymnasium

The Gymnasium has its origin in the cathedral and monastery schools established by the

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in the early

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, and seven of the schools established in the 12th and 13th centuries still exist today. The medieval schools had, broadly speaking, only one purpose: to educate the servants of the Catholic Church by teaching them to read, write, and speak

Latin Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through ...

and

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. After the

Reformation The Reformation (alternatively named the Protestant Reformation or the European Reformation) was a major movement within Western Christianity in 16th-century Europe that posed a religious and political challenge to the Catholic Church and i ...

's official implementation in 1536, the schools were taken over by the

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; their primary purpose remained preparing students for theological studies, only now it was for the benefit of the

Protestant Church Protestantism is a branch of Christianity that follows the theological tenets of the Protestant Reformation, a movement that began seeking to reform the Catholic Church from within in the 16th century against what its followers perceived to ...

. This educational base remained nearly unchanged until 1809, when the old Clergyman's School was transformed, in accordance with the spirit of the time, into a

humanistic Humanism is a philosophical stance that emphasizes the individual and social potential and agency of human beings. It considers human beings the starting point for serious moral and philosophical inquiry. The meaning of the term "human ...

Civil Servant's School, the purpose of which was to "foster true humanity" through immersion in the ancient

and

cultures combined with some teaching of natural science and modern languages. In 1871, the scientific and technical development of the 19th century led to a division of the education curriculum into two lines: the

language Language is a structured system of communication. The structure of a language is its grammar and the free components are its vocabulary. Languages are the primary means by which humans communicate, and may be conveyed through a variety of ...

s and the mathematics-science line. This division remained the backbone of the structure of the Gymnasium until the year 2005, when a major reform of the Gymnasium was enacted. Today, each Gymnasium offers a selection of lines decided by each individual Gymnasium. These typically include various linguistic, scientific, and creative lines, as well as combined-subject lines. In 1903, the languages line was divided into a classical line, preserving extensive teaching in Latin and Greek, and a modern languages line, in which Latin and Greek were replaced by English, German, and French. At the same time, the three-year course of the Gymnasium was directly connected with the municipal school through the establishment of the ''mellemskole'' ("

middle school A middle school (also known as intermediate school, junior high school, junior secondary school, or lower secondary school) is an educational stage which exists in some countries, providing education between primary school and secondary schoo ...

", grades 6–9), later to be replaced by the ''realskole''. According to the latest reform, the Gymnasium still offers three years of general upper secondary education in two lines. The division of the two lines into three branches each has however been replaced by a more flexible system, under which each of the lines contains a core curriculum of obligatory subjects and a number of optional subjects which can be taken at two levels.

Higher Preparatory Examination

The Higher Preparatory Examination (HF) was introduced in 1967 in a political climate that was characterised by a desire to extend educational possibilities to new groups in society. Originally, it was the idea to create a two-year course aimed specifically at prospective candidates for teacher training. There was however a concern that this concept might result in an educational cul-de-sac. So the course design was changed into an alternative route to further and higher education. The students that were entering the new HF-programmes were mainly adults. But from the start, the HF also appealed to young people who for social or personal reasons had not followed the straight route via the Gymnasium to higher education. The HF is thus the "sweeper" of the general upper secondary education level. In the Gymnasium, there is still an overrepresentation of middle class children (40% male/60% female), whereas the HF recruits its predominantly female students from a broader base of society (30% male/70% female).

Higher Commercial Examination Programme

The Higher Commercial Examination Programme (HHX) started in 1888 on a private initiative at Niels Brock's Business College in

Copenhagen Copenhagen ( or .; da, København ) is the capital and most populous city of Denmark, with a proper population of around 815.000 in the last quarter of 2022; and some 1.370,000 in the urban area; and the wider Copenhagen metropolitan ...

with a structure, which can mostly be found in the course today. The range of subjects comprised both commercial and general subjects. In 1920, the

Rigsdag Rigsdagen () was the name of the national legislature of Denmark from 1849 to 1953. ''Rigsdagen'' was Denmark's first parliament, and it was incorporated in the Constitution of 1849. It was a bicameral legislature, consisting of two houses, ...

(the parliament of the time) adopted the first business college act, which i.a. entitled the Niels Brock Business College to call itself a "higher business school". This act introduced supervision of the activities of the business colleges, and the HHX became a State-controlled examination. In 1927, the first ministerial orders were issued regarding the content of the teaching which in all essentials dealt with the existing teaching. The course was managed by the Ministry of Trade until 1965, when the responsibility was transferred to the Ministry of Education. The HHX did not originally qualify for admission to universities and other higher education institutions in the university sector. The universities did not consider the general part of the programme sufficient. It was not until 1972, that the HHX was given the status of a university entrance examination in connection with a revision of the content, along with the introduction of more rigorous admission requirements. At the beginning of the 1970s, about half of the Danish business colleges offered the programme. By 1982, the course was offered at all Danish business colleges.

Higher Technical Examination Programme

The Higher Technical Examination Programme (HTX) was established on an experimental basis in 1982. The reason for its establishment was a desire to contribute to a broader supply of education and training possibilities following the EFG-basic courses and a desire to create a new and relevant way of access to higher education in the technical area. In this context, it was of importance that fewer and fewer skilled workers continued at the engineering colleges, whereas the number of general upper secondary graduates increased significantly. Another reason for establishing the HTX-programme on an experimental basis was the need to strengthen the status of the technical schools. Broad education and training possibilities at the schools were to provide a broader and qualitatively better recruitment. In 1982, the HTX-experiment was carried out at the technical schools in

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, and

. The pilot period lasted until the spring of 1988, after which the programme was evaluated and made permanent after minor adjustments had been made to the individual subjects. On the same occasion, the HTX-examination was granted the status of a university entrance examination, and the graduates were now in principle placed on an equal footing with those of the Gymnasium, the HF and the HHX programmes as far as access to higher education was concerned.

Comparison of the three main Secondary Educations

Studentereksamen: The Danish General Upper Secondary School Leaving Certificate

* (STX) General Upper Secondary Education – The General Upper Secondary Examination: The STX-education accomplishes subjects within arts, social and natural science. * (HTX) General Upper Secondary Education – The Higher Technical Examination: The HTX-education accomplishes subjects within the areas of technological- and natural science in combination with general subjects. * (HHX) General Upper Secondary Education – The Higher Commercial Examination: The HHX-education accomplishes subjects within mercantile, international and vocational formation perspectives. The upper secondary courses are at three levels: level C (1 year), level B (2 years) and level A (3 years), of which the following subjects are compulsories: * *''Technical Science'' includes one of the following four courses: Building & Energy, Development & Production, Digital Design & Development and Process, Food Technology & Health * *''Culture Science'' includes one of the following five courses: Design & Architecture, Drama, Media Studies, Music and Visual Arts * *''Natural Sciences'' includes two of the following four courses: Biology, Chemistry, Information Technology and Natural Geography

Vocational secondary education

This section deals with the vocational education and training and basic social and health education programmes.

Apprenticeship Apprenticeship is a system for training a new generation of practitioners of a trade or profession with on-the-job training and often some accompanying study (classroom work and reading). Apprenticeships can also enable practitioners to gain a ...

training in a well-organised form originates in the guilds of the Middle Ages. Each trade had its own guild in each town. The guilds fixed the duration of the training of apprentices, their wages and working conditions and the disciplines they were to learn. It was furthermore the guilds which held the journeymen's tests.

Basic social and health education

The basic social and health education programmes (SOSU) were introduced in 1991, and the basic education programme for educator assistants was introduced in 1997. These programmes form part of the vocational upper secondary education system in Denmark.

References

{{Reflist

External links

Danish Ministry of Education – Upper Secondary Education
Education in Denmark