Every time I would get involved in export/exchange education projects in Finland, I would remind asking myself:
How did Finland change its own education system? How did the transformation happen?
Because when foreign visitors (like me, some years ago) come here, it is difficult to see beyond the amazing schools that appear in front of our eyes. One needs to understand that what we see today is the result of a long-term process, with conflicts of ideas and even drawbacks.
For example, did you know that…
- … Before WW2, Finnish primary education was formal, teacher-centered, and moral-oriented? It was inspired in the German model of education, in which more “capable” students were tracked to “academic subjects” and those students who were lagging behind (or, as they used to say, “preferred manual work”) were tracked to “vocational studies”.
- … Back in the 1950s, Finland had a public-private school system? Additionally, the government used to fund private schools in order to both support the post-war increased demand for education and extend government control over them.
- … After WW2, the three major transformation policy agenda in Finland were: accessibility (universal and unified education), curriculum (holistic and personalized education), and professionalism (qualified teachers)? Later, they also invested efforts on developing career counselling, so students would get more support on making decisions for their lives.
- … The Finnish Primary School Teachers’ Association was one of the strongest civil society organization in favor of an unified school system? Their ideas were in direct opposition to the general opinion of university professors back then.
- … After unifying the school system in 1970s, one of the first aspect to be developed was special needs support? So the schools could attend the diverse needs of pupils in order for all to reach education success.
- … Finland has mostly implemented education approaches based on research developed abroad, such as USA, Canada and UK? For instance, Finnish universities and schools were one of the first countries to implement in large scale the cooperative learning methodology from Johnson brothers.
