Maarit Virolainen

The views of employers on internships as a means of learning from work experience in higher education

This article examines internships as part of the apprenticeship model of learning adopted in higher education. We focus on employers’ views on internships, which have hitherto received only limited attention. Our study explores employers’ experiences in organizing internships, and their collaboration with one University of Applied Sciences, through data from social and health care employers (n=165), collected via a questionnaire. We conclude that if internships are to be improved as a means of learning from work experience, issues that employers want to raise within the collaborative framework require attention. These themes include relations with students, curriculum issues and the organization of the collaboration. A problem related to underestimating employer views on developing internships is that the resource-intensive nature of collaborative relations is silenced. As a result, targets for developing partnerships are left unrecognized, with adverse effects on the quality management and strategic planning of higher education institutions.

Finnish Vocational Education and Training in Comparison: Strengths and Weaknesses.

The study investigates how the Finnish model of providing initial vo- cational education and training (IVET) has succeeded in terms of enhancing educational progress and employability. A relatively high level of participation in IVET makes the Finnish model distinctive from those of three other Nordic countries: Denmark, Norway and Sweden. All four Nordic countries have well- organised labour markets and universal types of welfare states. Priority is given to goals related to equal opportunities and social inclusion. At the same time, these countries have different models of IVET. While the study compares the Finnish model of organising IVET to those of other Nordic countries, it also examines the German and UK models, which represent differing societal approaches to IVET. The differences in the outcomes of the IVET systems are described and analysed through reviewing secondary data provided by Eurydice and Eurostat, along with country reports produced in a Nordic comparative project, Nord-VET.

Building workplace learning with polytechnics in Finland: multiple goals and cooperation in enhancing connectivity

This article examines the goals of employers when they organise work placements for students. It explores how far, in cooperating with polytechnics, employers adhere to a connective model of students’ work experiences within their organisations. The paper makes use of a quantitative study based on employers’ responses to a questionnaire (n = 269). The study identifies four groups of employers: employers who emphasise the employment perspective, cooperative developers, employers with multiple goals and employers concerned with the development of their own work. The differences in employer profiles are discussed with respect to development of curricula and the higher education system. The paper raises questions concerning how curriculum development at various institutional levels may develop, depending on whether the emphasis is on work-based learning or on work-related learning.

Varieties of universalism: post-1990s developments in the initial school-based model of VET in Finland and Sweden and implications for transitions to the world of work and higher education

Abstract The Nordic countries are often referred to as a group even though their education systems and training models are very different. The aim of this study is to advance understanding of those differences and compare the developments and organisation of initial vocational education and training (IVET) in Finland and Sweden since the 1990s as examples of school-based models of IVET in statist regimes. The research questions address the following: how these two countries have institutionalised school-based IVET since the 1990s; the kinds of legislative reforms that have been decisive for the construction of school-based IVET; and how the models of school-based IVET in these two countries allow access to higher education and the world of work. The analysis shows the heterogeneity of the statist model of school-based IVET systems in two Nordic countries and underlines differences with respect to school-to-work transitions between IVET and different labour market sectors.

Work Experience Constructed by Polytechnics, Students, and Working Life: Spaces for Connectivity and Transformation

This chapter discusses the role of the connective model of work experience (Griffiths & Guile, 2004; Guile & Griffiths, 2001) in the context of higher education and identifies some of the limits and challenges that may be encountered in seeking to implement connectivity in practice. The question considered here is that of organising placements through cooperation between working life and the polytechnics1 in Finland. The process of introducing connective links appears to be somewhat contradictory but nevertheless negotiable, with plenty of room for improvement. As one teacher in social and health care put it: “Our students, when they go on a placement and they have been given the task, like, to figure out the central processes of the workplace, those main rehabilitation processes, this is a task the existing employees would not be able to do. That’s what it is . . .And our students will have to, they won’t get any guidance at the workplace, they will have to invent and think and that is what it is all about. And when we ask the employees, they say that students’ competences don’t meet their requirements, and our students are thinking about completely different things. They are thinking holistically about processes and actions at the workplace and then they are expected to open doors, and serve food and that sort of mechanical work.” This chapter seeks to scrutinise the contradictions in the relationship between polytechnics and working life. The question to be examined here is: How does