SIB Norway

Studentsamskipnaden I Bergen

The Student Welfare organization of Bergen (SiB) is a student welfare organization catering to approximately 30,000 students enrolled in higher education in the Bergen area. The main task of the student Welfare Organisation is to contribute to the well-being of all students – be it counselling, physical fitness, somatic health issues, housing, etc – during their time as students in Bergen. SiB also provides a service to those seeking help in relation to psychological problems. The student mental health Service (SMHS) employs seven specialists in clinical psychology, and one psychiatrist.

The Supported Education Project (SMS) in Bergen is currently funded by the Norwegian National Welfare Services Directorate, though we are embedded in SiB. The Supported Education (SMS) project here at SiB currently runs at a capacity of app. 35 students with moderate to serious psychiatric disability. We have over 45 students on the waiting list. SIB collaborates with all higher education institutions affiliated with SIB, state-run mental health institutions, special schools and psychiatrists and psychologists in private practice.

This project is the first of its kind in Scandinavia and the projects’ leaders in Bergen were given a national consultant responsibility to help implement similar projects in other regions of Norway where sufficient student populations exist. Now, six years after this designation, Norway has a total of eight Supported Education projects of varying age and organization. Within this network, SiB collaborates with the student welfare organizations in Oslo, Trondheim, and Tromso, next to some private institutions. A representative theme for all of these projects is that the demand for services far outweighs the supply available.

SiB will contribute to the project by doing the assessment in Norway and by co-developing the toolkit. It will also contribute to the dissemination of the project results.

ImpulSE brochure Norwegian