The Swedish curriculum for the Non-Compulsory School System (Lpf 94) conveys a twofold aim; the upper secondary school shall prepare the students for working life or studies at university/ university college. This aim goes for all programmes, both vocationally and theoretically oriented; upper secondary school will give all students basic eligibility for higher education, whichever of those two variants has been attended. About one hundred students at an upper secondary school in the middle of Sweden have been asked about their plans for the future and their attitudes towards the fact that every programme gives basic eligibility for studies at university and university college. The students, representing the Natural Science Programme, the Technology Programme, the Vehicle Engineering Programme, the Energy Programme, the Handicraft Programme (Hairdressers), and the Health Care Programme, are all in the third grade and just about to leave school in 2003. This study aims at comparing the future plans for students at vocationally and theoretically oriented programmes, and it is found that students from all programmes have plans for higher education, but there is a difference in extent. While practically every student at the theoretically oriented programmes intends to go to university or university college in the future, four students out of ten from the vocationally oriented programmes have such plans. What about their attitude towards the fact that every programme gives basic eligibility for higher education? The study shows a striking difference between vocationally and theoretically oriented programmes; there are twice as many among the students at the vocationally oriented programmes who are positive to this than among those at the theoretically oriented. In the latter group even a forth of the students are negative; but they are entirely positive to the fact that their own programme gives eligibility for higher education. Among the students at the vocationally oriented programmes there is no difference between their attitude and whether or not they have plans for higher education. There is a considerable difference between vocationally and theoretically oriented programmes as far as parents’ attitudes towards higher education is concerned. Three students out of four at the theoretically oriented programmes say that their parents find higher education important, while just a few of the students at the vocationally oriented programmes give this answer. In the latter group one fourth say that their parents don’t find higher education important, but there is no connection between plans and parents’ attitudes in this group. There is even a bigger difference between the programmes when it comes to the friends’ attitudes. More than half of the students at the theoretically oriented programmes say that their friends think that higher education is important, while almost as many at the vocationally oriented programmes say that their friends don’t think so.