A common way to support the development of gifted students is through acceleration. This could mean that students take some (or all) classes with students of a higher year-group, or that they remain with their biological Year-group but work on learning materials intended for older students (Southern & Jones 2015). Several international studies attribute positive outcomes to this strategy in terms of academic achievement, social circumstances, and emotional well-being (c.f. v Tassel-Baska 2023; Steenberger-Hu 2016; Rogers 2007; Dare & Nowicki 2018; Jovanovic et al. 2024).

 More recent changes in the Swedsih Education policy now support the acceleration of gifted and high-achieving elementary school students to upper-secondary level, and allow upper-secondary school students to complete their studies in less than the usual three years, intended to give them early access to university (Proposition 2023/24:79). 

Despite this, Swedish research has highlighted that acceleration is not without its challenges. For example, there is a lack of continuity and planned progression of such activities and accelerated students tend to be set to work in isolation from their peers. In addition, there is no recognition of the extended skills and content possessed by those who have been accelerated making their extra effort and capabilities effectively invisible (Sims 2023). Moreover, headteachers, who are essential in creating the right conditions for acceleration, are uncertain as to how to apply this strategy and do not possess the requisite knowledge to do so, making student provision uncertain (Ivarsson 2023). 

This presentation is based on the first results of a case study of students and their experinces of early entrence to university studies. In addition, we present how a selection of universities’ admittance boards  reason about accepting students via early entrance.

The results indicate that whether students succeed in being accepted varies. While some universities accept the students others deciline their application and treat the students as unqualified, while yet others want to accept the students but are unsure how to realise it in prcatice. 

As a matter of equity and inclusion, more work needs to be done to guarantee equal treatment between universities as  no common system is in place. We see that stronger collaboration between schools and universities is needed, as well as new routines for admittance and registration and how to sidestep an automatic application system based on a completed certificate from upper secondary level.