Application procedures for regular degree studies

Foreign students who are applying for higher education in Norway must meet both English and Norwegian language requirements in order to be qualified as applicants.

To meet the Norwegian language requirements, non-Norwegian students must either pass Norwegian (Norsk 2) for foreign students at a Norwegian upper secondary school (videregående skole) or pass the written Bergen Norwegian Language Test with a score of at least 450 points. The Bergen test is given three times a year and currently costs aprox. NOK 1000. For more information, please contact:

Folkeuniversitet - Norsk språktest

Christian Krohgsgate 34, 0186 Oslo

Phone: 22 98 88 22

Faks: 22 98 88 01

E-mail: norsk.spraktest@fu.no

Home page: www.fu.no (Click on Norsk Språktest and then English, if you need the text in English)

The English requirement may be met in any of the following ways:

• A passing grade from a Norwegian upper secondary school (videregående skole) Through a standardized test:
  • TOEFL (Test of English as a Foreign Language see http://www.toefl.org) with a minimum score of 500/170 points on the paper based/computer based test. For admission to the M.Phil. programmes the minimum scores are TOEFL is 550/230 paper based /computer based or IELTS with 6.0 or better.
  • IELTS (International English Language Testing Service) with a minimum score of 5.0 points (www.ielts.org)
  • APIEL (Advanced Placement International English Language examination with a minimum score of 3 points
• University of Cambridge tests:
  • First Certificate in English
  • Certificate in Advanced English
  • Certificate of Proficiency in English
• MELAB (Michigan English Language Assessment Battery with a minimum score of 85 points.
• One year of study at a university in Australia, Canada, Ireland, New Zealand, Great Britain or the USA. The language of instruction must be English.
• A university degree with a major in English'
• If special situations warrant it, applicants may document their English expertise in other ways.

Students from some countries may be exempted from documenting their competence in English as described above.

Financing:

There are no tuition fees at HIST (Høgskolen i Sør-Trøndelag); however, the cost of living in Norway is high. We emphasise that applicants to Regular Degree Studies at all levels must provide their own financing and therefore we stress the importance of having a realistic financial plan prior to coming to Norway.

In order to obtain a residence permit for Norway, students are required to document the possession of NOK 80 000 per year to cover living expenses. The Norwegian immigration authorities may insist on documentary evidence of adequate means of support for the entire period of study. This means that you will be required to document this amount for each year of your entire stay in Norway before you will be granted a residence permit. The Norwegian immigration authorities are very strict on this point; an application for a student visa which lacks such documentation will be turned down.

Application procedures:

The centralized application processing centre called UCAS, Universities and Colleges Admission Service (Samordna opptak), processes most applications to undergraduate studies at Norwegian public institutions of higher education. A board appointed by the Ministry of Education, Research and Church Affairs professionally administers UCAS, which is organized as a unit at the University of Oslo. In other words, all applications for admission must be sent to UCAS and NOT directly to HIST (Høgskolen i Sør-Trøndelag). Applicants must meet the basic requirement for admission to Norwegian universities and the language requirements described above. It is only possible to apply once a year. The application deadline is 1 March for students with education from abroad. For those applying on the basis of education from a Nordic country, the application deadline is 15 April.

In general, admission to higher education in Norway is in some areas highly competitive. Excellent grades are an essential prerequisite to securing a place.

Applications are available directly from UCAS or from HIST. The application process involves two steps:

Completing the preliminary application form indicating, among other things, which courses of study you are interested in and at which university/college. DO NOT SEND TRANSCRIPTS or other enclosures with this application form. Deadline for students educated outside Scandinavia: 1 March. Students who fulfil admission requirements will receive the final application form (omslagsark) from UCAS by 1 June (if you have not received this form by 1 June, contact UCAS at the latest by 10 June). You then return this form, along with your transcripts and letters of recommendation to HIST (or the university/college you are applying to). Deadline for submission: 1 July. Applicants will be notified by 25 July. Application via UCAS is based on the assumption that the student is currently residing in Norway. For students residing abroad the late notification date may cause a delay in obtaining a student residence permit.