In an Australian first, Victoria University students will no longer juggle multiple university subjects at the same time.

The university is rolling out a Swedish teaching model that allows students to focus on one subject for four intensive weeks, before moving onto the next one.

This alleviates one of students' most common gripes: being hit with four assignments at once and having them all due in the same week.

The model was offered to first-year students this year and due to its popularity and success will now be expanded to second-year students next year and then across all bachelor and postgraduate courses in 2020.

Among first years, there has been an immediate boost in retention, grades and pass rates.

First-year student retention increased from 80 to 87 per cent while the pass rate jumped from 72 to 87 per cent.

Alice Growden, 19, has seen her grades grow from a distinction to a high distinction. The Commerce/Law scholarship recipient started her degree at Victoria University under the traditional university model, and is now finishing her first-year subjects under the new model.

Ms Growden attributes her performance boost to the fact she’s no longer flung between different subjects, across two different disciplines, every week. Her classes are also smaller.

“I can focus,” she said.

“I am learning a lot more; I feel like the information is easier to understand this way. It’s easier to do better. You are not slammed by four different assignments at once. It is much more balanced.”

This balance has allowed the teenager to also intern at a law firm, work in corporate suites at the MCG, and pursue a swag of sports including AFL, volleyball, netball, and tennis.

Victoria University vice-chancellor Peter Dawkins said the university was convinced that learning in blocks – a practice adopted at some universities in Sweden and Canada – was superior.

“It’s a much more intensive, deeper learning experience,” he said.

“A block timetable enables students to accelerate their learning, resulting in earlier graduations if desired, slow down their learning because of other life events, or spread their study across the whole year, dipping in and out as necessary, to better combine study, work and lifestyle."

The university initially introduced the model because it wanted to improve the experience of first-year students, who have a high risk of dropping out.

Students from low socio-economic backgrounds, who make up a large proportion of enrolments at Victoria University, are at increased risk of not completing their degree.

Recent research from the Grattan Institute found about one in five students who start university are more likely to drop out than finish their degree.

It also revealed that completions rates at Australian universities have dropped since 2008, with 16 per cent of first-year students not returning the following year.

The National Tertiary Education Union has previously protested against Victoria University's new model.

It has said academic staff who teach intensively have less time to conduct research.