Access to Higher Education in Finland : Emerging Processes of Hidden Privatisation

This article focuses on the hidden processes of privatization in access to higher education in Finland, and the role of economic capital in the admission process. The relevance of this analysis derives from the discourse around educational equity in Finland and the emerging contradiction of tuition-free higher education that still requires economic resources from the applicant prior to admission, but is rarely discussed in terms of economic inequalities leading to educational reproduction. These aspects are investigated through qualitative content analysis of interviews with central stakeholders (n = 17) operating in different areas of the field of university-admission. The results show how the privatization of public education (exogenous) manifests as shadow education alongside the public university system. There is thus a need to re-evaluate the forms and consequences of privatization in and of public education in Finnish HE.Peer reviewe

The homology between the private and the public fields in higher education

External privatisation of public education has emerged in Finland in the admission to higher education. A field analysis of thematic interviews (N = 22) with powerful actors in the private educational market and middle-class young people applying for places at universities in the highly competitive disciplines of medicine and law was conducted. The research task was to examine the discourses that construct the limits of the public and private fields, and the kind of homology that emerges. Four discourses were identified: support, business, social responsibility, and personal responsibility. The private field distinguished itself from the public fields through the discourse of business and attached itself to it through the discourse of support. The dominance of the symbolic power of transformed economic capital in the private field mobilised in the public field was misrecognised during the admission process as 'motivation'. The homology between the two fields was strong yet hidden.Peer reviewe

Inclusion and marginalization of learners in primary education (Finland)

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Alone or Together in the Neighbourhood? School Choice and Families’ Access to Local Social Networks

This study explores how the everyday geographies of city life and families’ access to social networks in the neighbourhood influence families’ school choices. The data consist of thematic interviews with parents of 8–14-year-old children (n = 170) in three urban areas located in the cities of Paris (France), Milan (Italy) and Espoo (Finland) and are analysed via qualitative content analysis. The findings indicate that the families’ access to local social networks influences the reasoning behind school choice to the local school. The children’s relationships with other children and adults in the neighbourhood are considered important, but additionally, the parents’ networks with other parents in the area, mediated by the school, play their role. School choices as practices should therefore be analysed not merely as choices of an institution, as they comprise various aspects concerning the surrounding neighbourhood as a physical and social space.Peer reviewe

School Choice, School Markets and Children's Urban Socialization

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Discursive Narratives of Comprehensive Education Politics in Finland

In recent years Finnish comprehensive education has often been discussed in both, academic and public forums, in terms of its relatively high learning outcomes and perceived efficiency. Yet what has often been lacking in cross-country comparisons is a critical socio-historical analysis of contingent nation-specific events and features as well as an in-depth analysis of Finnish education politics as constantly changing dynamic system. We analyze and reconstruct the discursive narrative of Finnish comprehensive education within a socio-historical framework. The material consists of interviews with the establishment of Finnish education: politicians, leading policy-makers and stakeholders, and established scholars (n=9). Three periods were recognized and reconstructed in the analysis: 1) The pre-comprehensive school period, 2) a steady development culminating in the crisis of the 1990s, and 3) the PISA results, which in the narrative led to international success and national gridlock. The crucial changes relate to changes in audiences (performing game). Two key findings emerge from this discursive narrative analyses: the role of the PISA reports as a turning point for the basic education politics in Finland and how this turn led to a discussion of comprehensive school as a kind of success story.Peer reviewe

School choice research in five European countries: the circulation of Stephen Ball's concepts and interpretations

This article analyzes the influence of Stephen Ball’s work on research on markets and school choice in five European countries (Finland, France, Norway, Spain, and Sweden). The main focus is on the intellectual circulation of ideas, but the authors also take into account the relationship between ideas and social and political changes, as well as between ideas and the organization of research communities. Concepts derived from policy sociology are used to examine the dissemination of concepts and interpretations. Three areas of study are taken into account (school choice policies, choice as a class strategy, and choice within local education markets). The conclusion points out differences between countries and underlines the need to take into account processes of migration of ideas between national research communities in a more integrated European research area

Choosing Private Compulsory Schools : A means for class distinctions or Responsible Parenting?

This study aims to explore the social and ethnic background of pupils admitted to private schools at the compulsory level in Iceland so as to identify possible social class segregation between public and private schools. Additionally, we examine how parents reason their choice of private education for their children. Bourdieu’s concepts of capital, symbolic power and distinction are used to think through our findings. Data consist of descriptive statistics and interviews with parents. Our findings show that many of the private schools attract privileged parents, but that this is contingent upon the schools’ geographical location. Parental discourse links good behaviour and ambition with the private schools, while simultaneously labelling the public schools as failing. Parents who align with the intellectual fraction show signs of experiencing a moral dilemma over their choice. Overall, our findings suggest that to some extent, private schools serve as a tool for educational distinction.Peer reviewe

Families and the Social Space of School Choice in Urban Finland

This dissertation is positioned in the fields of sociology of education, urban sociology and family studies. The focus of the study is on schools and families lower-secondary school choices in 2010s urban Finland. The study consists of four academic articles and an introductory part, in which the results of the four original articles are presented and discussed in relation to each other. The first sub-study (I) is a literature review, in which the application and transmission of concepts in school choice research in five European countries is examined. The three empirical sub-studies (II−IV) concentrate on how the reputations and prestige of schools and their general and selective classes in the case city of Espoo are constructed in the parental discourse, what sorts of lower-secondary school choices the families conduct in relation to those hierarchies of symbolic prestige, and which factors seem to be interrelated to the success in the competition over certain study positions. The analysis concentrates on the differences in reputation between general and selective classes across and within schools, the constructed urban spaces of school choice, and families choices. The ways in which the educational trajectories of the pupils diversify and differentiate in basic education were analysed. The data consists of 96 semi-structured thematic interviews with parents of 6th graders. The interviews were conducted during the spring of 2011 in the research project Parents and School Choice. Family Strategies, Segregation and School Policies in Chilean and Finnish Basic Schooling (PASC). The data includes parents from all school catchment areas. The interviews were analysed by applying theory-informed qualitative content analysis. The theoretical framework leans strongly on Pierre Bourdieu s theory and conceptualisations of distinction. The analysis focuses on how the conducted school choices relate to families possession of different forms and combinations of cultural, social and economic capital and how these processes relate to the symbolically differentiated space of school choice. The study deals with who chooses, what is chosen, and especially with how and why. The parental discourse on school choice has been contrasted with the noted worry concerning the increase in urban segregation in the metropolitan area, the social and academic school differentiation, and the general condition of the Finnish comprehensive school. The space of school choice in the city of Espoo was divided into two separate spaces of school choice in the parental discourse: the local space of school choice and the selective space of school choice. The central divide was the pupil selection conducted by some of the schools to their selective classes. The local space of school choice consisted of general classes in schools within the catchment area. In some of the local spaces the symbolic hierarchy of the general classes was non-existent, but in some local areas the general classes across schools had a strict hierarchy. The general class in the bottom of the hierarchy was considered to be a study environment to avoid. The most common way of aiming to avoid the school allocation to those aversive classes was to apply for classes with a special emphasis. These classes comprised the selective space of school choice, which covered the whole city area and did not follow any catchment area borders. The transition from the local space to the selective space of school choice required different forms and amounts of cultural, social and economic capital from the family, and was not thereby equally accessible as an option to all families. In addition, the most desirable choices for the parents in their discourse were not the classes with elite reputations with high selectivity and presumably demanding teaching. The most desirable classes were often considered to be good enough in terms of teaching and learning, and somewhat selective, as long as desirable amounts of social and ethnic diversity existed. Contentment with school was emphasised in the discourse around the most desirable classes. The elite classes were avoided due to their expectedly high levels of unnecessary competition between pupils. The analysis on the school choices of upper-class families showed how the mobilisable amounts of different forms and combinations of capital strongly impacted the process of school choice. Optimising the school choice of the child in the competition over study positions was interconnected with social capital, as well as with the mechanisms of transforming and transmitting cultural and economic capital from one form to another and from one field to the next. The most successful with the highest numbers of realistic choices were those possessing the most amounts of capital. The role of social capital was emphasised. The success of the upper-class child in the competition seemed to derive from the habitus, and via their shared lifestyles success in the school choice seemed natural among them. The social differentiation produced by the practices of selection of pupils were noticed in the parental discourse, and the choice was legitimised by referring to meritocratic selection procedures and talented and motivated children. The cultural capital derived from the field of culture, such as skills in music or sports, turned out to be relevant trump cards in the competition over study-positions in selective classes within publicly funded compulsory education in Finland. The central features in the optimizing of the choice were the families capacities to evaluate their own position in the social space in relation to other families in the field as well as to the symbolic hierarchy of the schools. This combination is named as the social space of school choice. The limitations to parental action are urban limitations, caused by the urban structure of the city, as well as the borders of educational governance (e.g. catchment areas). The central notion is that the differentiation of school choices across families (how the families are able and willing to conduct school choices) are related to their possessed amounts of capital also in Finland. Interestingly, these processes of pupil selection seem to guide pupils from different social backgrounds seemingly naturally to different educational trajectories already within comprehensive education.Tämä koulutussosiologian, kaupunkisosiologian ja perhetutkimuksen rajapinnalle sijoittuva tutkimus kohdistuu kaupunkien kouluihin ja perheiden kouluvalintoihin lapsen siirtyessä perusopetuksen alakoulusta yläkouluun 2010-luvun suomalaisessa kaupunkiympäristössä. Tutkimus koostuu neljästä tieteellisestä artikkelista ja yhteenvedosta, jossa artikkeleissa esiteltyjä tuloksia esitellään ja kehitetään edelleen suhteessa toisiinsa. Ensimmäinen artikkeli (I) on kirjallisuustarkastelu, jossa on arvioitu kouluvalintatutkimuksen käsitteiden käyttämistä ja paikallista siirtymistä viidellä kielialueella Euroopassa. Kolmessa empiirisessä artikkelissa (II IV) tutkimustehtävänä on ollut tarkastella, millaisiksi tutkimuskaupungin, Espoon, koulujen maineet rakentuvat vanhempien puheessa, millaisia kouluvalintoja perheet tekevät suhteessa koulujen ja niiden luokkien välisiin havaittuihin mainehierarkioihin, ja millaiset osatekijät näyttävät vaikuttavan siihen, keillä lapsista on parhaat edellytykset pärjätä kilpailussa koulutuspaikoista. Tutkimuksessa tarkastellaan koulujen välisiä ja sisäisiä maine-eroja, niiden muodostamia erilaisia kouluvalintatiloja ja perheiden tekemiä kouluvalintoja. Työssä on analysoitu sitä, miten koulutuspolkujen eriytymismekanismit rakentuvat tehtyjen koulutusvalintojen kautta jo perusopetusvaiheessa. Aineisto koostuu 96 espoolaisen, kuudesluokkalaisen lapsen vanhemman puolistrukturoidusta teemahaastattelusta, jotka on toteutettu keväällä 2011 Parents and School Choice. Family Strategies, Segregation and School Policies in Chilean and Finnish Basic Schooling (PASC) -tutkimusprojektissa. Aineistossa on vanhempia Espoon kaikilta oppilasalueilta. Aineisto on analysoitu teoriasidonnaisen sisällönanalyysin avulla nojaten Pierre Bourdieun distinktio-teorian käsitteistöön. Työssä on analysoitu, miten perheiden väliset erot kouluvalinnoissa jäsentyvät puheessa perheen kulttuurisen, sosiaalisen ja taloudellisen pääoman määrän ja komposition mukaan ja millaisia eriytyviä koulutuspolkuja nämä prosessit yhdessä symbolisesti eriytyneen kouluvalintatilan kanssa muodostavat jo perusopetusvaiheessa. Tarkastelussa on kuka valitsee, mitä valitaan ja erityisesti miten ja miksi. Perheiden koulutusstrategioihin liittyvää puhetta on tulkittu suhteessa esitettyyn huoleen kaupunkitilan sosiaalisesta ja koulujen sosiaalisesta ja tiedollis-taidollisesta eriytymisestä sekä suomalaisen, ennen yhtenäiseksi mielletyn, peruskoulun tilasta. Kaupungin kouluvalintatila jakautui maineeltaan vanhempien puheessa kahteen erilliseen tilaan, paikalliseen ja valikoivaan kouluvalintatilaan, joiden rajapinnan ensisijainen jäsentäjä oli koulujen toteuttama oppilasvalikointi. Paikallinen kouluvalintatila koostui kodin ympärillä olevan hallinnollisen oppilasalueen koulujen yleisopetuksen luokista, joihin oppilaat osoitettiin lähikouluperiaatteella. Osalla oppilasalueista koulujen välinen mainehierarkia oli olematon, mutta osassa paikallisia kouluvalintatiloja maineet jäsentyivät symboliseen hierarkiaan. Hierarkian huonomaineisimman luokan välttämisestä puhuttiin. Yleisin välttämisen keinona mainittu strategia oli siirtyminen painotetun opetuksen luokista koostuvaan, koko kaupungin kattavaan valikoivaan kouluvalintatilaan. Tämä siirtymä kuitenkin vaati perheeltä paitsi taloudellista, myös sosiaalista ja kulttuurista pääomaa, eikä siksi ollut käytännössä yhtäläinen ja todellinen mahdollisuus kaikille. Toisaalta mainehierarkioiden tarkemmassa tarkastelussa osoittautui, ettei useinkaan toivotuin ja omalle lapselle sopivimmaksi mielletty luokka ollut maineeltaan valikoivin ja tiedollis-taidollisesti vaativin. Toivotuimman luokan piirteiksi valtaenemmistöltään keskiluokkaisessa aineistossa mainittiin riittävän hyväksi mielletty opetus ja oppiminen, jonkinlainen oppilasvalikointi kuitenkin säilyttäen luokkakokoonpanon vähäinen sosiaalinen ja etninen moninaisuus ja erityisesti korkea koulutyytyväisyys ja -hyvinvointi. Eliittimaineisia luokkia vältettiin tarpeettomaksi mielletyn oppilaiden välisen oletetun kilpailun vuoksi. Yläluokkaisten perheiden kouluvalintojen tarkastelussa havaittiin, miten mobilisoitavissa olevien pääomien määrä ja kompositio vaikuttivat kouluvalinnan onnistuneeseen toteuttamiseen. Lapsen kouluvalinnan optimoiminen kilpailussa oppilaspaikoista nivoutui paitsi tietynlaiseen sosiaaliseen pääomaan, myös kulttuurisen ja taloudellisen pääoman muuntamisen ja kentältä toiselle siirtämisen mekanismeihin. Parhaiten kilpailussa oppilaspaikoista vaikuttivat selviytyvän ne, joilla oli näitä kaikkia. Sosiaalisen pääoman merkitys korostui. Yläluokkaisten lasten menestyminen oppilasvalikoinnissa valikoiville luokille juontui habituksesta ja elämäntyylistä ja näyttäytyi siten luonnollisena . Oppilasvalikoinnin tuottama havaittu sosiaalinen eriytyminen kouluissa nostatti silti puhetta valikoinnin legitimaatiosta, joka palautui meritokratialla oikeuttamiseen ja puheeseen lahjakkaasta ja motivoituneesta lapsesta. Oli havaittavissa, että muilla kentillä toimiva kulttuurinen pääoma, kuten lapsen taidot musiikissa tai urheilussa, osoittautui kelvoksi valttikortiksi myös kilpailussa oppilaspaikoista suomalaisen julkisrahoitteisen perusopetuksen sisällä. Optimoinnin keskeisenä tekijänä olivat perheen kyky oman asemansa hahmottamiseen suhteessa koululuokkien symboliseen järjestykseen ja omien pääomien muodostaman aseman tarkastelu suhteessa muihin kentällä toimiviin perheisiin. Tämä yhdistelmä on tutkimuksen yhteenvedossa nimetty sosiaaliseksi kouluvalintatilaksi. Sosiaalisen kouluvalintatilan muina rajaajina toimivat kaupunkitilan muodostamat urbaanit rajoitteet ja kouluhallinnon asettamat valinnan rajoitukset. Keskeinen havainto on, että perheiden kouluvalinnat ja niiden eriytyminen ovat myös suomalaisessa kaupunkiympäristössä sidoksissa perheen pääomiin. Oppilasvalikoinnin muodot ja perheille mahdollistuva toiminta sosiaalisessa kouluvalintatilassa muokkaavat oppilaiden valikoitumista perusopetuksen sisällä, mikä hiljaisesti ja näennäisen luonnollisesti ohjaa eri yhteiskuntaluokista tulevia lapsia ja nuoria eri koulutusreiteille jo perusopetusvaiheessa

Preparatory course market and access to higher education in Finland : pocketful or pockets-full-of money needed?

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