Educationalists gain a national co-operation union for students
The board of SKOL ona Hallasaari, Malva Envall, Johanna Ojama and Alice Jäske.
Founded at the beginning of the year, Suomen Kasvatustieteiden Opiskelijoiden Liitto is a co-operation union for students of educational sciences in Finland. The unofficial abbreviation of the organisation is SKOL. The organisation aims to develop co-operation between students of educational sciences from different cities and to promote the field on the labour market.
When founding the union, Oona Hallasaari, Alice Jäske, Malva Envall and Johanna Ojama drew from their previous experiences with student associations. Their starting point was the desire to develop the national activities of educational sciences and to establish better networks around Finland. Now, SKOL is promoting the genuine excitement and the feel of “pride for educational sciences”.
There is not just one field of educational sciences but a whole group of them.
Students in the field learn diversely about, for example, developmental trends in education and school systems, and prepare for various types of planning, research, teaching and administrative tasks for organisations in the education and schooling industry.
In addition, educational sciences aim to explore how education is linked with various societal phenomena in a complex manner.
Even though educational sciences have been taught in Finland since the foundation of the Royal Academy of Turku, they were not established as their own field of study until the mid-19th century when the first academic chair of educational and pedagogic sciences was instituted.
Students of educational sciences and student associations in the field like to organise events, such as cruises.
They have also organised two trips to a summer cottage.
The other trip spurred the creation of Suomen Kasvatustieteiden Opiskelijoiden Liitto, or SKOL for short.
“In Finland, the field of educational sciences does not have the long traditions of, for example, medical and law students who have a stronger sense of identity,” says Alice Jäske, vice-chair of the union.
“Those students also gain various co-operation partners from the business world. That is the direction we wish to go in as well.”
“Gathering from all around Finland at a cottage, we noticed that there was a vast amount of potential but no common operator that could uphold our pride for our field and our great team spirit. SKOL aims to strongly respond to this need,” says Oona Hallasaari, chair of the union.
Be proud of your field of study
The idea of founding a union to bring all the students of educational sciences in Finland together stemmed from both the tangible need and the desire to promote the diverse expertise in the field.
Chairs Oona Hallasaari and Alice Jäske, the union’s secretary Johanna Ojama and treasurer Malva Envall knew that SKOL existed as a Facebook group but it lacked proper coordination. The group simply functioned as the communications channel and noticeboard of the boards of various student associations.
“We felt that there was a need for someone to organise and coordinate activities in the field,” says Ojama.
“Johanna set up a WhatsApp group where we started to brainstorm,” Jäske continues.
“We also let the boards and students of student associations know we were establishing a union. We received extremely positive feedback and messages offering help,” says Envall.
From the start, the idea was to make the union official as the people involved felt that the activities might otherwise fade out of existence due to busy study schedules or student exchanges abroad, for example. All the work required to set up the union was done without compensation and in the students’ free time, powered by the idea that the task was too important not to see it through.
“There was no budget for founding the union. Trade union Specia provided expert assistance and initial funds that enabled us to launch the activities and, for example, set up our new website,” Hallasaari says.
SKOL aims to encourage all students of educational sciences to feel proud of their field as well as to make the field more well-known and attractive among employers by means of efficient networking.
For this purpose, the union aims to organise excursions to workplaces and share generally accepted ideas for all student associations.
“It’s important to be proud of your field of study; it means you are able to sell your expertise to employers. We want employers to focus on hiring educationalists in the future,” concludes Hallasaari.
Low-threshold union as a key goal
The student associations of educational sciences are often very active locally and will continue their own activities despite SKOL.
Ojama emphasises that the union absolutely does not mean to eliminate local activities but, on the contrary, wants to enable them.
SKOL wants to remain an approachable, low-threshold union.
“It was a conscious decision to develop the union’s activities through social media. We have used Instagram Stories, for example, to ask students about their wishes and thoughts concerning the autumn programme,” Jäske explains.
“Any student of educational sciences can reach us through social media and suggest an activity. On the other hand, we are also able to be close to everyone via social media,” continues Hallasaari.
“I’m proud of all of us as we now have an existing union that has gained a large number of followers on social media. People already know who we are and what we’re doing.”
According to Envall, one of the greatest benefits of founding the union was her newfound courage and determination; she now finds it easier to take action and start working towards her goals. Other people are also a great source of strength.
“We want to prevent educationalists from feeling uncertain or insecure when asked about their plans for the future. We have expertise that sets us apart from everyone else. There are really cool people working in the organisations of our field. We should be proud of all this,” Envall summarises.
Text: Juha Wakonen
Pictures: SKOL