Gurushala

Research & Policy

What can we learn from Finland's education system?

Nelson Mandela once rightly said,

“Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world.”

India has undoubtedly been working really hard in trying to improve its education system, an example being the New Education Policy, 2020, which seeks to work on the holistic development of the student. However, we can still learn a lot from the Finnish education system that seeks to not only provide a holistic education but also an egalitarian one to all its students.

While the education system in India is still focused on marks and grades, the education system in Finland does not have an examination system for the first few years with the main exam being held at the age of sixteen. The schools in Finland provide extra support for weak students with an assistant teacher to help them. This is not the case in India as the population is high and the teacher-to-student ratio is highly skewed. The teacher is, therefore, not able to focus on the weak students and thus end up focussing on the brighter ones to improve their class results. Thus, this is at the core of the flaws in building citizens for the future.

The success of Finland’s education system comes both from its structure and society. They believe in making society an egalitarian one. The teachers there also work hard with students who they feel need extra care and support. India too needs to work on this 'caring' aspect to help the weak students come up and match to the level of the average students. We will have to work towards it so that the investment in education is not wasted. We can connect it with the Right to Education where, in every class, at least 25% of students should be from the weaker section of the society, who will need extra care and support, outside the classroom network. Discussions and talks on this aspect can be done at the government level too.

Another aspect that we need to look at is that here in India, we have a notion that education provided by private schools is better than public ones. But in Finland, by investing heavily in education, along with ensuring that all schools provide the same level of quality, it has created a more equitable system that produces results across the board. We need to ensure that the quality of education provided in the public schools matches that of the private ones so that the divide between the two is reduced. What matters the most, however, is that the quality of teachers is improved with equal importance being given to their training. Unless we have the teachers who put in their best and provide care to the students equitably, there is little hope for the weak students.

About the author

Divya Joshi is working in Pratham Education Foundation and works on aspects of Content Creation for the teacher capacity development portal: Gurushala. Any views expressed are personal.

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