Reykjavík Grapevine - 26.08.2011, Blaðsíða 22

22
The Reykjavík Grapevine
Issue 13 — 2011 Most people feel seem to feel pretty jaded about 'student politics' and they usually
don't care what their 'student politician' classmates are up to. Is this 'a worrying
development'? How could 'student politics' change to make themselves more ac-
cessible and interesting?
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You can never have too
much education, and Ice-
land has seven universi-
ties for only 320.000 peo-
ple. Apparently, you can have too
many schools; at least some people
think that the seven universities
that our great society maintains
might be somewhat of a stretch of
our "recently limited" financial re-
sources. One of them teaches arts,
two of them how to raise horses
and sheep, but the other four do the
typical stuff schools do.

There is however only one active stu-
dent politics scene in Iceland, and that’s
in the University of Iceland (Háskóli
Íslands—HÍ for short). That Univer-
sity hosts around 15.000 students, and
quite a lot of teachers and staff. There
are 25 faculties and a place called
Háma, where you can learn, lounge, or
just eat lunch. Elections at HÍ are held
February each year, and students vote
through the internet, which is really
cool, all technical and hip. That means
that students can even vote while in
Háma, or just while they are listening to
their teacher. Or not listening.
There are two big political move-
ments at HÍ, Röskva and Vaka, and
they have been around for quite some
time and both enjoy considerable sup-
port. Smaller parties sometimes pop up,
and for the past two years a newcomer
named Skrökva has arrived on the
scene, with impressive results. Röskva
and Vaka are both female names in
Iceland, which fits well for HÍ, since
women are a large majority of students,
but Skrökva is a verb which means be-
ing untruthful, alluding to the deceptive
nature of politics.
Röskva and Vaka have historically
been connected to political parties in
Iceland. Maybe not officially, but if you
investigate parliament members, mem-
bers of city and town councils and po-
litical youth movements, you can see a
tendency of these people having been
affiliated at some point with Röskva or
Vaka. This does not apply to Skrökva,
perhaps since it is a recent movement
and they focus on abolishing the par-
ties, they want to vote for people, not
parties. Maybe a good idea. Or not.
Röskva is the left leaning movement
in the university and is often associated
with Samfylkingin, the Social Demo-
cratic Alliance and Vinstrihreyfingin—
grænt framboð—the Left-Green Move-
ment. Vaka defines themselves as the
democratic alliance, and they are most
often associated with Sjálfstæðisflok-
kurinn, the Independence Party, the
big right-wing party in Iceland that has
dominated Icelandic politics, mostly
since its inception. As stated earlier,
Röskva and Vaka are not officially af-
filiated with these political parties, but
again, they share members as they
share ideals.
Even though these connections are
relevant, the differences between the
two big movements in the University
of Iceland do not mirror those of their
supposed counterparts in parliament.
This has to do with context and com-
plexity. The debate is more focused;
we all fight for all students. Everybody
should have good housing options, fair
student loans and all students should
have good teachers and facilities,
whether they are studying medicine
or medieval studies. Essentially, every-
body should be able to get education.
Student Politics in Iceland
Back To School | Politics
While it's true that Iceland's univer-
sities are indeed very affordable,
with yearly fees for most schools
(minus textbooks) amounting to a
week's salary per semester, maybe
you don't want to live with your par-
ents while going to school. Maybe
you even already live on your own.
Maybe you’ve started a family? Or
perhaps you're from overseas, and
want to study in Iceland. In that
case, you need to take a little trip
to the offices of Lánasjóður Íslen-
skra Námsmanna (“The Icelandic
Student Loan Fund,” LÍN for short).
WHAT IF YOU’RE A FOREIGNER?
First things first: if you're a foreigner,
you might not even qualify for a loan.
Article 13 of the Icelandic Student Loan
Fund Act specifically states: “Students
shall not be entitled to student loans
under this Act if they are entitled to
comparable loans from another state.”
This is an important point: if your coun-
try has a student loan system that will
pay any amount of money to study
abroad, LÍN will most likely show you
the door and advise you to contact loan
officers in your home country.
But that's not to say all is lost. If
you're from a Nordic country, or one
of the countries in the European Eco-
nomic Area (EEA), you have the same
rights as Icelandic students. If you're
from the EEA but don't have a job, you
can earn those rights when you have
lived in Iceland for at least five years;
then you might be able to get a student
loan. So how does that work?
Well, first you need to get accepted
to an Icelandic university and register
for classes. Once you have that done,
you need to bring your financial state-
ments regarding what you've earned
in the past year, proof of identity, and
bank account information to the LÍN's
offices. This last bit of information is
important, as LÍN works very closely
with Iceland's banks; some would say
too closely.
HOW THE BANKS ARE INVOLVED
It used to be that taking out a student
loan was a matter between you and
LÍN. But in 2004, LÍN and Landsbanki
signed a deal wherein a new system
was created. Whether the bank pres-
sured LÍN for a slice of the pie or not,
the fact remains that the system today
works like this:
You get a loan from LÍN for one
semester, based on your school, your
classes, and your past income (and you
need to have been steadily employed
for twelve months prior to applying for
a loan). Other circumstances, such as
what you pay in rent and how many
children you have, also come into play.
Once your loan amount is determined,
LÍN contacts your bank, and this is
where it gets tricky.
The bank doles out parcels of the
loan to you, on a monthly basis, in the
form of an overdraft. They do this based
on an agreement with LÍN that the bank
will get this money at the end of the se-
mester. In order for you to get your loan,
you need to sign a contract with your
bank agreeing to take out said over-
draft. Once the semester is over, LÍN
pays your bank the full amount, and
that should be that.
But there's a catch: if you fail one of
your classes, LÍN will not pay. Now you
owe this money not to LÍN, but to your
bank. And interest rates on overdrafts
can be pretty steep. This can put stu-
dents in a potentially tricky situation:
on top of failing, you now have a six-
figure debt, or higher, to attend to, and
chances are you're going to have a hard
time paying that down while going to
school. Back to the workforce with you!
Smooth sailing on borrowed money
The involvement of the banks remains
controversial to this day, but assum-
ing everything goes well in school,
it should be smooth sailing until you
graduate. The interest rate on a student
loan is only 1.2%, remarkably low when
compared to other countries, with re-
payments beginning two years after
graduation and continuing from any-
where for 10 to 40 years.
Iceland's student loan system, while
perhaps unnecessarily complicated by
the involvement of private banks, can
work well for the average student who
passes all their classes and becomes
gainfully employed within a couple
years of graduating. So long as you're
from the right country, study hard, and
get a job quickly after you finish school,
you should have absolutely no prob-
lems with getting an Icelandic student
loan.
You Need To Pay For School Now?
How Iceland's student loan system works
Back To School | Money
PAUL FONTAINE
ALÍSA KALYANOVA