Michael Weisman wrote: > If Finland is not charging non-EU, then that is the best deal on Earth. I > wish I had known.
Yes, Finland does currently offer free education for non-EU students. The bizarre thing is that after getting this free education, you have only 6 months time to find a job, otherwise you have to leave the country. The free education for non-EU students is very likely to disappear if the new law is passed. Some more comments about the Finnish situation - There were simultaneous demonstrations in several cities this week, the biggest one was in Helsinki with approx 1500 participants. This amount does not sound like much, but Finland is a small country and demonstrations are quite rare here. A new petition against the new law is now online, there are right now 3842 names there including 83 professors from different universities, I guess several thousand names will appear within the next days. It's surprising that these demonstrations are happening so late. In 2005 a law was passed that caused big changes in the way universities are managed, basically modifying the Finnish system to fit the Bologna agreement. The new law introduced more careful monitoring of productivity of universities: a lot of new forms to be filled, more numeric goals to reach (funding based on how many papers are produced, how many people graduate every year, etc) and salaries based on the productivity. Some people protested - professor Heikki Patom?ki from Helsinki University has been (and still is) the most visible opponent of this development. I personally studied under the 'old system', where students were given a lot of freedom and responsibility, which meant that instead of rushing through the educational system as efficiently as possible, many of us started part-time work during study time, or did minor subject studies in other schools. In the current system students have much more pressure to get their masters degree in planned approx 4 years. It's maybe needless to say that in my opinion the old system produced better results. The new law that is about to be passed brings many changes to the educational system. The most controversial are currently the changes in high level decision making. Students, researchers, professors and everyone involved in the academic activity might in some cases have no voice in the University board. The board would consist of people decided by the Ministry of Education and funders (=companies). Even the rector of Helsinki School of Economics has objected to this new arrangement. It is very interesting to see how things develop... And how much the laws can actually change what individual people and departments do. There is right now an interesting discussion going on on the iDC list about education, and I thought this comment by Davin Heckman was great: // I mean, there are two distinct things that I do: One is a form of labor: showing up, taking attendance, assigning crap, grading it, and then following some ridiculous grading rubric that assigns a point value to some mundane task that the student is forced to carry out. In exchange, they get a grade and I get money. In my opinion, this is all just a cover for what professors, students, and universities really do. The other thing, and this is what I really do in class, beneath this bizarre theatrical labor, is share thought processes. I mean, I spend so much of my time writing things and sharing them with students, that I have a hard time imagining that anyone could adequately compensate me for it. So much of my writing is done with my heart and mind on my own three children, that I cannot really imagine someone really paying me an appropriate amount of money for it. But I share it with my students because I like them. And the students who really want to explore these ideas, well, they get invited to dinner at my house to talk further about these things. Or we go out to coffee and read extra books together. I really don't imagine that anyone is paying for this or that I am getting money for it. // What Davin is writing about is something that I can experience within the Finnish universities that are about to go through the new changes in structure. There is a lot of uncertainty in the air about the new administrative structure but the people involved in actual teaching know what their basic task is and why they've chosen their profession. This spring I'm working as the curator for the spring show of Helsinki University of Art and Design. This university will be combined with the Helsinki University of Technology and Helsinki School of Economics to form one big 'Innovation University' (this was the official working title) that will be called 'Aalto University'. This initiative is at the heart of the current controversy - the new law was drafted mostly to make this new Aalto University possible. The three universities in question are amongst the oldest, biggest and most respected ones in Finland. The academic staff in them is a very strong community. Some are very excited about the fact that the three schools will be combined. So am I - the process is shaking the old routines and there is room for new initiatives. And simultaneously there is a strong criticism and resistance towards the new administration and corporate power. Many professors and departments have made it clear that they will not change their research and education to fit the current business trends. The new dean of Aalto University (she was just recently elected) made this kind of statement in her first major interview. Also, the Aalto University might accidentally spawn another new initiative - the 'Art University' that would bring together several art universities in Helsinki. So, I guess the point that I wanted to make is that even if the new law would pass, it would be still nearly impossible to crush the basic strengths of an educational community. The law in it's current form does not seem to fit the needs of the academic community, and thus it will not work - it is impossible to use police force to control university teaching. If the community has the strength to protest, it will also have the means to bend the rules. But I sincerely hope that the demonstrations will have an effect and we don't have to start acting as villains. Juha. .: [email protected] :: www.juhuu.nu :: www.pixelache.ac :. # distributed via <nettime>: no commercial use without permission # <nettime> is a moderated mailing list for net criticism, # collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets # more info: http://mail.kein.org/mailman/listinfo/nettime-l # archive: http://www.nettime.org contact: [email protected]
