Educational philosophy in Finland is strikingly different
than in the United States, but the students there outperform U.S. learners.
BY STEPHEN TUNG
The Finnish school system might sound like a restless
American schoolchild's daydream: school hours cut in half, little homework, no
standardized tests, 50-minute recess and free lunch. But the Finns'
unconventional approach to education has vaulted Finland to the upper echelon
of countries in overall academic performance, according to the Organisation for
Economic Co-operation and Development.
Finnish students have ranked at or near the top of the
Program for International Student Assessment ever since testing started in
2000. In the most recent assessment in 2009, they ranked sixth in math, second
in science and third in reading. By comparison, U.S. students ranked 30th, 23rd
and 17th, respectively, of the 65 tested countries/economies.
But Finland's system hasn't always been successful.
"Finland had been traditionally thought of as the
lowest achieving country in Scandinavia, and one of the lower achieving ones in
Europe for a very long time. It was not a highly developed education
system," said Linda Darling-Hammond, the co-director of the Stanford
Center for Opportunity Policy in Education, in a lecture delivered Tuesday
afternoon about the Finnish educational success story. She introduced the main
speaker, Pasi Sahlberg, a Finnish education expert and the director of the
Center for International Mobility and Cooperation in Finland's Ministry of
Education and Culture.
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