This is the paradox highlighteted by Maja Horst, Dean of the Faculty of Arts at Aarhus University, and Unni From, Head of the School of Communication and Culture, in an op-ed published in the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten.

Their starting point is Cognitive Science at Aarhus University. From 2027, the bachelor’s programme will be taught in Danish, which means that international students will no longer be able to enrol. This is not because of concerns about the quality of the programme or the employment prospects of its graduates. On the contrary, more than 90 per cent of graduates from the 2021-2023 cohorts were in employment within the first year after graduating.

According to Maja Horst and Unni From, Cognitive Science is a concrete example of a broader challenge in Danish higher education policy.

On the one hand, Denmark wants to attract more international students and graduates with skills that businesses are looking for. On the other hand, political restrictions mean that universities are required to reduce admissions to English-taught programmes.

And when an international degree programme changes, more is lost than the language of instruction. International academic environments take years to build through students and staff from different countries, professional networks and collaboration across national borders.

In their op-ed, Maja Horst and Unni From therefore call for greater consistency between Denmark’s ambition to attract international talent and the conditions universities are given to educate and retain it.

Read the op-ed

Businesses are crying out for skilled workers – but Danish policy is standing in the way

By Maja Horst, Dean of the Faculty of Arts at Aarhus University, and Unni From, Head of the School of Communication and Culture at Aarhus University

From 2027, Aarhus University will lose one of its successful international bachelor’s programmes in its current form. Cognitive Science will in future be taught in Danish, which means that international students will no longer be able to enrol in the bachelor’s programme. At the same time, an English-taught degree programme that has benefited both Aarhus University and Denmark for more than a decade will disappear.

Cognitive Science combines knowledge about people, language and behaviour with data and technology, and it addresses questions that have become even more relevant with the development of artificial intelligence and language models. Its international character is also one of the programme’s strengths, as Danish and international students encounter different academic perspectives and work together across backgrounds and national borders. This is precisely the kind of environment that prepares students for a labour market in which both technology and businesses are becoming increasingly international.

The programme is not being changed because of concerns about its quality or its graduates’ employment prospects. On the contrary, more than 90 per cent of graduates from the 2021-2023 cohorts were in employment within the first year after graduating. Cognitive Science is affected because Aarhus University is subject to a politically imposed cap on the number of places for international students and must therefore reduce admissions to English-taught programmes.

Our criticism is therefore directed at the political framework framework that makes it necessary to change a successful international degree programme.

This is difficult to understand at a time when Denmark lacks employees with strong technological skills and needs to attract more international students and graduates. Politicians have, after all, opened up more places on English-taught programmes in technology, natural sciences and IT at university colleges and business academies precisely because businesses are short of qualified labour. At the same time, other political restrictions are forcing universities to reduce admissions to English-taught programmes.

In one part of the education system, we are opening the door to more international students because Denmark needs their skills. In another, we are closing it.

The issue is therefore not simply that Cognitive Science must close its bachelor’s programme to international admissions. The broader question is whether it makes sense to pursue a higher education policy that weakens successful international academic environments at a time when Denmark needs precisely the talent and skills these environments help attract and educate.

We are forgetting the human dimension in the tech debate

When we discuss Denmark’s need for technological skills, the focus often falls on engineers, programmers and graduates in the natural sciences. We need them, but technology is neither developed nor used in a vacuum. The technological labour market of the future will also need people who understand language, behaviour and communication – and, not least, the interaction between people and technology.

This is particularly true of artificial intelligence (AI). AI is not only about code and computing power. It is also about how people communicate, make decisions and respond to the technologies we develop. Cognitive Science sits precisely at this intersection. Students work with experiments, statistics and the modelling of human behaviour, combining knowledge about people, language and communication with data, analysis and technology.

We will need more of this combination – not less. We need to be able to develop new technologies, but we also need to understand how they interact with people, how they affect our behaviour and communication, and what happens as algorithms play an increasingly important role in the decisions we make.

The debate about the tech talent of the future therefore becomes too narrow if it primarily focuses on educating more engineers, programmers and natural scientists. Denmark also needs people who can bridge the gap between technology and the people who use it. Cognitive Science demonstrates that this combination of skills is in demand in the labour market.

We are losing more than a language of instruction

International students are also potential future employees, researchers, entrepreneurs and taxpayers. When they study in Denmark, meet Danish students and businesses and build a network here, they also develop ties to the country. Not all of them will remain in Denmark after graduating, but higher education is nevertheless a powerful route to international recruitment.

This is also the logic behind the wish to create more places on English-taught programmes in areas where the labour market needs graduates. The same logic should apply to programmes that are already delivering strong results. If Denmark wants to attract international specialists, it makes sense to bring more of them here while they are students rather than waiting until they are qualified and established in other countries before competing for them.

But the loss involved in making Cognitive Science a Danish-taught programme is not simply that fewer international students will have the opportunity to come to Denmark. An international academic environment is not merely a Danish degree programme that happens to be taught in English.

Over more than a decade, Cognitive Science has developed an academic environment in which the international recruitment of both students and staff has helped shape the programme. The environment has also contributed to interdisciplinary collaboration in areas including data, technology and research into human behaviour.

When international students disappear from the bachelor’s programme, Danish students lose something too. They will have fewer fellow students with different backgrounds and perspectives and therefore less exposure to the international reality in which many of them will later work.

Academic environments like these take a long time to build. The language of instruction can be changed by a decision, but an international academic environment cannot simply be recreated if the political framework changes again a few years later.

Make the policy add up

We are not arguing for unlimited international admissions. We are arguing for consistency in the policy being pursued.

If Denmark wants to attract more international talent, and if businesses are demanding the skills this talent brings, universities should have the opportunity to maintain and develop strong international academic environments when quality, employment outcomes and societal needs all support doing so.

Cognitive Science is one example. Here, we have built an international academic environment in a field where Denmark needs the skills and where graduates find employment. If politicians believe that Denmark needs more international talent, higher education policy must also give universities the opportunity to attract and retain it rather than forcing us to close the door to some of it.

The op-ed was originally published in Jyllands-Posten on 19 September 2026.

CONTACT 

Dean, Faculty of Arts, Maja Horst
E-mail: dean.arts@au.dk

Head of School, School of Communication and Culture, Unni From
Mobile: +4551361949
E-mail: imvuf@cc.au.dk