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EDUCATION

Zurich ranked world’s 7th best place to study

Zurich is the seventh best city in the world in which to study, according to a new table ranking university cities.

Zurich ranked world's 7th best place to study
ETH Zürich/Susi Lindig

Home to the ETH technological institute and the University of Zurich, Switzerland’s biggest city received high praise from QS, the group that compiled the rankings, for the quality of its education as well as its calm atmosphere and dramatic scenery.

ETH Zurich is the highest ranked university in continental Europe, QS noted, while the city itself receives routine accolades for the quality of living on offer.

The city is also steeped in wealth, a fact QS said had both its benefits and drawback. 

“On the one hand its affluence means Zurich is clean, safe and immaculately maintained, but on the other, living expenses can be eye-wateringly high,” QS said. 

“That said, while rent and socialising may cost a packet, tuition fees averaging around US$1,000-2,000 for international students represent a huge saving compared to comparably prestigious universities in the UK, North America or Australia.”

According to QS, Zurich’s two institutions have a combined total of 42,000 students. Of these, 10,000, or 24 percent, are international students.

Paris topped the inaugural Best Student Cities table, which ranks cities according to measures taken from “public information, population sizes, number of educational establishments and their quality (as judged by the QS World University Rankings.” 

London emerged as the world’s second best study city, followed by Boston, Melbourne, Vienna and Sydney.

After Zurich, Berlin, Dublin and Montreal rounded out the top ten.

More on this story from The Local:

France: Paris best city for students

Studying in France: what you need to know

Sweden: Stockholm ranked among world’s top student cities

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EDUCATION

Sweden’s Social Democrats call for ban on new free schools

Sweden's opposition Social Democrats have called for a total ban on the establishment of new profit-making free schools, in a sign the party may be toughening its policies on profit-making in the welfare sector.

Sweden's Social Democrats call for ban on new free schools

“We want the state to slam on the emergency brakes and bring in a ban on establishing [new schools],” the party’s leader, Magdalena Andersson, said at a press conference.

“We think the Swedish people should be making the decisions on the Swedish school system, and not big school corporations whose main driver is making a profit.” 

Almost a fifth of pupils in Sweden attend one of the country’s 3,900 primary and secondary “free schools”, first introduced in the country in the early 1990s. 

Even though three quarters of the schools are run by private companies on a for-profit basis, they are 100 percent state funded, with schools given money for each pupil. 

This system has come in for criticism in recent years, with profit-making schools blamed for increasing segregation, contributing to declining educational standards and for grade inflation. 

In the run-up to the 2022 election, Andersson called for a ban on the companies being able to distribute profits to their owners in the form of dividends, calling for all profits to be reinvested in the school system.  

READ ALSO: Sweden’s pioneering for-profit ‘free schools’ under fire 

Andersson said that the new ban on establishing free schools could be achieved by extending a law banning the establishment of religious free schools, brought in while they were in power, to cover all free schools. 

“It’s possible to use that legislation as a base and so develop this new law quite rapidly,” Andersson said, adding that this law would be the first step along the way to a total ban on profit-making schools in Sweden. 

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