FOR the employed phd
Most PhD students are employed by LNU, which gives other dimensions to their situation. Here we have gathered some important information on your role as an employee at LNU.
Thanks to PhD student Linnea Andersson for allowing us to use some of the information from her KoB PhD project room on MyMoodle!
If your are just recently employed, your should probably start looking at the university´s web page for newly employed and then come back here.
Please see the right hand side meny on this web page.
According to Swedish law, a PhD student is considered to be both an employee and a student, so you can be a member of both a student union and a trade union. However, as much as we would like, we cannot help PhD students with strictly work-related issues as it falls outside the Student Union’s mandate. We can typically only help in study-related matters.
To get help with issues related to your work and employment we (as well as LNU) strongly encourage PhD students to join one of the trade unions at LNU. Most of them work with PhD matters locally as well as on national level.
Sweden has a long history of trade unions, and there are therefore quite a few to chose from. You simply have to do your own research and find the one that seems best for you.
There is some information at LNU’s web page, but we also suggest looking at Academic positions and LNU’s Career Center, and especially their Job Ready Programme.
Healthcare and mental healthcare
In Sweden we have both public and private healthcare of good quality. There are different levels of care:
- In cace of emergency go to the emergency department at the hospital. If you need ambulance call 112. (Same number for police, fire department and ambulance).
- If you can wait till the next working day call your medical center (vårdcentral). If you need medical advise no matter day or time call 1177.
We recommend that you create an account at the public healthcare platform 1177.se where you can keep track of all your details. At the bottom of the page you can change language.
Wellness allowance
Employees are entitled to a wellness allowance of to 3000 SEK per year. Read more about it!
Occupational health services and ergonomics
Please see the LNU page for details.
If you get sick
Please find out what you need to do if you get sick at Illness and rehabilitation. More about rehabilitation here.
Student Welfare Office
If you feel stressed, depressed, anxious, have relationship problems or are going through a crisis the Student Welfare Office is there for you. They work with well-being and is available in both Kalmar and Växjö for all student, including PhD students. They believe in early intervention, high availability, low thresholds and can be a great first contact if you are not well. Find out more about what they offer, or book a consultation!
The Student Welfare Office also offer courses, group activities in Kalmar and Växjö as well as online lectures and sessions related to mindfulness, yoga, stress management and more.