Finnish Education--Leading in the World

Finnish education is nothing like ours (US).  It is amazingly quite different and yet, as American's we believe that Asia and us are on the for-fronts of discovery and intelligence. This however is untrue. Did you know that Finland students are ranked in the top 3 for all categories of standardize testing (PISA, which tests a range of skill of knowledge)? It was not until the 1960's that Finland changed their education system after acknowledging voices that said that education has a direct impact on our economy. They soon realized this to be true and began the changes. 


A question I would like to pose is; is the competitiveness within our country actually benefiting us? As Garrett Bassett mentioned, the competitiveness in part is what makes our country ours? It's growth in economy, entrepreneur philosophy etc... But what about now, as our economy is failing us? Could it all be a result from our education system? Could it be because it's too competitive, not enough people can gain educations?

To continue on with Finnish education, In the 1960's they began a top-down education system, restructuring their school systems to focus on equality. The have no private schools, no private universities and everyone who finished a level of education, can move on to the next. They moved from standardizing everything to no standardized tests at all and they letting each teacher test and assess how the student is doing individually. Finland also has more confidence in their professors, and they are looked up to within the society. I think this plays a part on the success of the education greatly. 


"Since the 1980s, the main driver of Finnish education policy has been the idea that every child should have exactly the same opportunity to learn, regardless of family background, income, or geographic location." Reference There is no separation of classes.  I would like to ask, what has happened? I believe that there is so much separation of classes now and it all started with John Dewey. He believed that dividing and making it noticeably different classes was a great idea. Dewey rearranged our whole education system back in the 1800's to what it is today. He implemented super structured schools, such as blocks of classes, scheduled and at the same time day after day with standardized tests. 


Our education has had the whole turn around. It went from one-room schools, to factory schools and now, maybe we can go back to what it once was. Individualized. 


In part, we can thank John Dewey for this great innovation......or NOT. Within the Finnish system, the amount of time they spend in school is far less, they don't start school until the age of 7, after they have had some time to grow up a little and play. They even stay with the same teacher year after year. The teacher then is able to aid in each child's learning and literally grows up with them. 


I have heard that as you age your brain is constantly upgrading. That many people actually do better if they wait a year or so to start school and it is not forced upon them at such a young age. Like your brain is able to comprehend things better. This has happened to me personally in my life. I had a really challenging class, O-chem last year that I just could not get. I dropped it part way through and began taking it again this semester and it just seems to click so much better.--I want to research more on this subject. 


There is so much to do and to consider in order to make the change of our educations system such as, How can you keep track of students' performance if you don't test them constantly? How can you improve teaching if you have no accountability for bad teachers? With such a big government run program, that is nation wide, how can you implement something new? Is there as way to run beta tests and keep revamping until golden? 
 Pasi Sahlberg, who is an expert on the Finnish education reform stated the following, "First, we don’t necessarily need new schools like charter schools to develop innovative educational changes in our school systems. First and foremost we need less standardization and testing in our schools. What we need more is flexibility, educational leadership, and trust in schools and teachers." http://www.pasisahlberg.com/blog/


This topic sparks my interests tremendously and I think could play such a huge role in the building back up of our economy and further supplying a nation with intelligent individuals who are ready to make a difference in the world. 


References:

http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2011/12/what-americans-keep-ignoring-about-finlands-school-success/250564/

http://nepc.colorado.edu/blog/learn-from-finland-pasi-sahlberg

http://www.pasisahlberg.com/blog/

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8601207.stm

https://www.msu.edu/user/frassine/EAD845%20-%20Educational%20Reform%20in%20Finland.pdf