MEDIA RELEASE
For release Tuesday 18 August 2009
High regard for education a key to Finland’s success
Likely reasons behind Finland’s continued success in international tests of student achievement will
be presented to a leading education conference in Perth today.
Professor Patrik Scheinin from the University of Helsinki will present the case of the Finnish
comprehensive school to discuss strategic questions of educational policy, teacher education and
teaching in a keynote address to the Australian Council for Educational Research (ACER) annual
conference.
Finland has been a top performer in the OECD Programme for International Student Assessment
(PISA) since its inception. The country’s education system has been closely scrutinised by educators
around the world, keen to find the answers to why some countries perform better than others on PISA.
Professor Scheinin will tell conference delegates that how the school system of a country manages the
students’ learning potential counts more than the amount of money a country spends on education or
other socioeconomic factors such as parents’ education or students’ attitude towards school.
“The countries with the best PISA results do all manage to ensure that the weaker students are not left
behind,” Professor Scheinin says.
“What makes the Finnish school system specially interesting from the perspective of educational
policy is that it is the only comprehensive school system with top PISA results.”
Professor Scheinin attributes Finland’s success to a combination of factors including the nation’s high
regard for education and the teaching profession; the high standard of applicants for teacher training; a
nationally coordinated curriculum and the nation’s inclusive comprehensive school system that
provides all students with a high quality general education.
“The role of schooling as part of the Finnish history and cultural heritage is remarkable,” Professor
Scheinin says. “Education of the people was used as a strategy in creating the nation and teaching has
been and still is a highly regarded profession.”
Patrik Scheinin is a Professor of Education and the Dean of the Faculty of Behavioural Sciences at the
University of Helsinki. He is a Vice Director and a founding member of the Centre for Educational
Assessment and a member of the steering group of the Finnish PISA project.
The ACER Research Conference 2009, Assessment and Student Learning: Collecting interpreting and
using data to inform teaching, takes place in Perth from 16-18 August 2009 at the Perth Convention
and Exhibition Centre.
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Phone (03) 9277 5582 or 0419 340 058