The short answer
When a student in year 9 or year 10 risks not qualifying for a national program at gymnasiet, the school is required to offer tuition during school holidays. This is called lovskola, and it is not a favour the school chooses to extend: Skollagen places a clear duty on the school to make the offer.
The law uses the word shall. The school shall offer lovskola.
What the law says
The statutory obligation sits in 10 kap. 23 a and 23 b §§ of Skollagen. The current text (Lag 2025:729) sets out two distinct situations.
After year 9 (10 kap. 23 a §): “En huvudman ska … erbjuda lovskola till elever som har avslutat årskurs 9 och som riskerar att i nästa årskurs inte uppfylla betygskriterierna för betyget E i ett eller flera ämnen och som därigenom riskerar att inte uppnå behörighet till ett nationellt program i gymnasieskolan.” (A school authority shall … offer lovskola to students who have completed year 9 and who risk not meeting the grade criteria for the grade E in one or more subjects and who thereby risk not qualifying for a national program in gymnasieskolan.) This lovskola must be arranged in June the same year the student completed year 9, and must total at least 50 hours.
During year 10 (10 kap. 23 b §): For students in year 10 who remain at risk, the school must offer lovskola during the breaks within the school year, totalling at least 25 hours. And after year 10, for students who still haven’t qualified for a national program, a further 50 hours must be offered in June.
The definition of lovskola in Skollagen (1 kap. 3 §) makes clear it is “undervisning inom grundskolan som anordnas … under lov under en termin eller utanför terminstid” — tuition within the grundskola arranged during a term break or outside term time. It is not obligatory for the student to attend, but the school must make the offer.
Why this matters for neurodivergent students
NPF students as a group are significantly overrepresented among those who leave year 9 without qualifying for gymnasiet. Attention difficulties, processing differences, and the cumulative effect of years of uneven support mean that the gap between what a student knows and what their grades show can be large.
Lovskola is not a substitute for proper support during the school year. It does not replace the extra anpassningar or särskilt stöd a student should already have in place. But for a student who has had an uneven final year and sits close to the line, a structured 50 hours in June can make the difference between qualifying and not.
The duty triggers without any formal process. No utredning is required. No application from the family. If the school determines that a student risks not qualifying, the offer must come. What families need to know is that if the offer does not come when it should, they can ask for it, and the school’s obligation under 10 kap. 23 a § is the basis for that ask.
What the offer looks like in practice
Lovskola is tuition, not assessment. The school decides where to hold it (10 kap. 23 e §). It can run for at most eight hours per day and cannot be scheduled on weekends or public holidays (10 kap. 23 c §). If the educational goal is met before the full 50 hours are complete, the school can end it early.
Once a student accepts the offer, attendance is expected. Skollagen (10 kap. 23 d §) requires that a student who accepts lovskola “ska delta i den verksamhet som anordnas för att ge den avsedda utbildningen, om eleven inte har giltigt skäl att utebli” (shall participate in the activities arranged to provide the intended education, unless the student has a valid reason for absence). Unexcused absences must be reported to guardians the same day.
For a student with ADHD or autism who finds the school environment difficult, the intensity and novelty of a June lovskola session — smaller groups, different setting, different teacher in many cases — can be either easier or harder than the regular school year. The support that would help in lovskola is the same support that helps generally: knowing what is expected, structure, brief clear goals, and being told immediately when something is going well.
What a school can deduct
A school that has already voluntarily offered lovskola between August of year 9 and the following spring term can count those hours against the mandatory June offer. If a student has already participated in at least 50 hours of voluntary lovskola arranged by the school, the formal obligation for the June session is considered met (10 kap. 23 a § second paragraph). This matters for families because it means the school cannot simply say the obligation is met without showing which hours are being counted.
The coming 2028 reform
The version of 23 a § that takes effect from 2028 uses different language for the trigger: “riskerar att inte kunna tillgodogöra sig de kunskaper” (risks not being able to acquire the knowledge) to match the new grading framework. The underlying obligation — to offer lovskola to students at risk of missing gymnasiet qualification — remains the same. Lag (2026:1243).
What to do if the offer does not come
If a student is approaching the end of year 9 and the school has not mentioned lovskola, the family can raise it directly: ask the rektor whether the school has assessed whether the student meets the conditions in 10 kap. 23 a §. The school has a duty to assess and, if the conditions are met, to offer. If the school refuses and the family believes the conditions are met, a complaint to Skolinspektionen is the formal route.
Lovskola is one piece of the larger picture. The right to support does not stop at the grundskola gate: if a student reaches gymnasiet, the same framework for extra anpassningar and särskilt stöd applies there too.