From decentralized means-testing to the centralized management of stipends and loans. The administration of student financial aid in Denmark 1950–2000.

This study is a historical investigation of the state education grants and loans system in Denmark during the period 1950–2000. Since 1952, Danish students enrolled in higher education programmes have been subsidised under a unified public financial aid scheme, with varying degrees of general coverage. During the first decades of the state support arrangement, the amounts offered were low, and targeted the neediest students on a purely discretionary basis. Today, financial aid is granted to all students, in the form of universal and rights-based transfer payments. This paper focuses on the institutional traits of the aid scheme, paying special attention to its level of decentralisation, and examines the critical points in the evolution of the legal and administrative framework behind the student support system in Denmark. The central aim of this study is to provide important insight into the policy and organisational development of a national financial aid scheme for students. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]