Their main purpose was to prepare the students for theological studies by teaching them to read, write and speak Latin and Greek.
Moreover, the religious movement of Pietism, spreading in the 18th century, required some level of literacy, thereby promoting the need for public education.
Throughout the 19th century (and even up until today), the Danish education system was especially influenced by the ideas of clergyman, politician and poet N. F. S. Grundtvig, who advocated inspiring methods of teaching and the foundation of folk high schools.
This division was the backbone of the structure of the Gymnasium (i.e. academic general upper secondary education programme) until the year 2005.
Previously, students wanting to go to the Gymnasium (and thereby obtain qualification for admission to university) had to take private tuition or similar means as the municipal schools were insufficient.
In 1975, the realskole was abandoned and the Folkeskole (primary education) transformed into an egalitarian system where pupils go to the same schools regardless of their academic merits.
Others are more practically oriented, training students for jobs as e.g. artisans or clerks through a combination of instruction in vocational schools and apprenticeship.
[15] Students can supplement the SU with low-interest government loans amounting to DKK 2,807 per month, which must be paid back upon the completion of their education.
[16] Wright and Ørberg (2008) came to a critical conclusion on the Danish system of higher education: "The Danish model combines the worst of both the free trade and the modernising state models of autonomy: universities, their leaders and academics are given freedom in the sense of individual responsibility for their own economic survival, whilst the sector comes under heavy political control.