2025

Strengthened opportunities for the unemployed to attend municipal adult education

Unemployed people who do not have a high school education have difficulty competing in the labor market. More unemployed people therefore need to take part in municipal adult education in order to be able to find work. The Public Employment Service's access to information about job seekers' participation in municipal adult education also needs to be improved. The government has therefore decided on a legislative referral. It contains, among other things, proposals for a duty of information for municipalities towards the Public Employment Service. 

In recent years, several measures have been implemented to make it easier for job seekers to take part in municipal adult education. This is to strengthen the individual's opportunities in the labor market. However, several challenges remain. One such is that the Public Employment Service does not have access to the information required to be able to follow up and monitor job seekers who study in municipal adult education. 

In the legislative referral, the government therefore proposes that municipalities should be obliged to provide relevant information about job seekers to the Public Employment Service. This would enable the Public Employment Service to follow up on the support provided to job seekers during their studies. It would also create better conditions for the Public Employment Service to detect mismanagement among participants in labor market policy programmes and decide on sanctions, for example if a participant has not applied for a training programme he or she has been instructed to apply for. In this way, the risk of incorrect payments will also be reduced. 

The legislative amendments are proposed to enter into force on March 1, 2026.

More information (in Swedish)

Stricter requirements in Swedish for immigrants

The legislative council's report contains proposals for amendments to the Education Act that will strengthen municipal adult education in Swedish for immigrants (SFI).

The proposals entail the following:

• The right to participate in SFI shall, as a general rule, apply for three years from the time when the person was first accepted for the education.
• The municipality shall draw up an action plan for its efforts to reach the people in the municipality who are entitled to SFI and to motivate them to participate in the education. The action plan shall be continuously monitored and revised if necessary.
• Those who are entitled to SFI shall also have the right to participate in the education in a municipality other than their home municipality if there are special reasons. A municipality that accepts a student from their home municipality in SFI shall receive compensation for its costs for the student's education from the student's home municipality.
• When a student is accepted for SFI, the student's knowledge shall be assessed, unless such an assessment is clearly unnecessary. The result of the assessment shall form the basis for the individual study plan.
• The individual study plan for a student in SFI shall contain information about the time when the student was first accepted for the education. If the student transfers to SFI with another principal, the principal the student leaves must hand over the student's individual study plan to the receiving principal.

The amendments to the Education Act will enter into force on 1 January 2025. For those who have been accepted to SFI before the entry into force, the right to participate in the education will apply until 31 December 2027.

For more information (in English)

2024

Bildung, education and participation

The Government's special investigator has handed over the Liberal Adult Education Investigation's report "Bildung, education and participation – liberal adult education policy in a new era". 

There have been recurring problems with cheating and inaccuracies within the adult educational associations' activities, and the investigation proposes several measures to strengthen control and increase transparency. The proposals will hopefully sort out the problems so that liberal adult education can focus on the important work that is being done, not least for groups with disabilities. 

The Liberal Adult Education Investigation has had a broad mission to propose changes aimed at ensuring appropriate management, follow-up and control of the state subsidy to liberal adult education, while the intention of the mission was that liberal adult education should be given the best conditions to operate in the future. An overarching issue has been to analyze the current control and distribution model for the state grant with the aim of making it more effective, transparent and predictable and reducing the risk of fraud and errors. 

The investigation's proposal also includes:  

• a new goal and a new goal structure for liberal adult education policy
• indicators for monitoring liberal adult education
• a new model for regular follow-up and evaluation of the state contribution to liberal adult education
• strengthened control of the state subsidy
• a new model for state participation in the audit of the The Swedish National Council of Adult Education (Folkbildningsrådet) and SISU Sports Trainers
• a system for withdrawing state grants and handling unused funds. 

All of the investigation's proposals are proposed to enter into force on 1 January 2026.

For more information (in Swedish)

2023

Nothing to report.