Search results for "higher education"

Change and continuity in the academic profession : Finnish universities as living labs

2019

The academic profession is challenged by the changing environment. Global trends, such as managerialism and new public management, have been influencing all public organizations, including universities. The academic profession is dynamic by its nature; it reflects any changes in its environment. However, the academic profession is also characterized by continuity. In this study, we describe the current changes and continuities of the academic profession in Finland, as perceived by top and middle managers employed in Finnish Universities. We found out that logics and values by organizational professionalism are emphasized; however, occupational professionalism is also deeply rooted in the pr…

Experiences of arbitrary management among Finnish academics in an era of academic capitalism

2020

For the last two decades, Finnish universities have faced the implementation of new systems of control and undergone dramatic changes that have worsened academic working conditions–such as corporatisation and budget cuts. This article explores Finnish academics’ experiences of university reforms with a special focus on the consequences it has had in terms of organisational socio-dynamics. We adapt Glynos and Howarth’s logics of critical explanation and apply this theoretical framework to analyse the interviews of academics who, against their own will, did not have their contracts renewed. This approach describes, explains, and criticises the logics–which are social, political and fantasmati…

Visibilities and invisibilities in academic work and career building

2021

In the current turbulent higher education environment, academic work and career building are in a state of flux. The implementation of the principles of New Public Management have intensified managerial control over academic work. Growing dependence on external funding and metrics-based performance assessments have made career building increasingly competitive, selective, and risky. Disciplinary and organisational boundaries have been dissolving as interdisciplinary and cross-sectoral ways of collaboration have become policy priorities. These trends have challenged visible boundaries between disciplines, organisations, sectors, work tasks and academic roles. However, at the same time, new v…

All in the same boat : a comparison of intercultural interaction between home students and international students in two universities

2012

Tutkielman tarkoituksena on selvittää kansainvälisten opiskelijoiden kokemuksia kansainvälisestä kanssakäymisestä paikallisten opiskelijoiden kanssa. Tutkielman on aikomus tarkastella, onko eri kulttuureissa opiskelevilla kansainvälisillä opiskelijoilla samankaltaisia kokemuksia ja näkemyksiä paikallisista opiskelijoista. Aiemmissa tutkimuksissa on käynyt ilmi, että vaikka kansainvälisten opiskelijoiden kokemukset vaihtokaudesta tai tutkinnon suorittamisesta ulkomailla ovat olleet pääasiassa positiivisia, varsinkin kanssakäymisessä paikallisten opiskelijoiden kanssa on edelleen parantamisen varaa, sillä kansainväliset opiskelijat kokevat paikalliset opiskelijat vaikeasti lähestyttäviksi ja …

Policy is what happens while you’re busy doing something else: introduction to special issue on “language” indexing higher education policy

2016

Traditionally, language has had three functions in higher education. It has been seen as a medium of teaching; as a means of archiving knowledge in different text depositories like books and libraries; and as an object of theoretical study (Brumfit 2004, 164). Brumfit’s typology acknowledges the fact that language somehow crosses the everyday experience of everyone working, studying or otherwise engaged at universities—in other words, in knowledge production. In recent years, however, two major trends in higher education policies have challenged Brumfit’s classification and called for attention to language in a new way: internationalization and globalization policies on the one hand, and kn…

Assemblages of language, impact and research

2022

Three scholars—of languages and knowledges, of translation and writing, and of higher education—discuss societal impact as a higher education policy goal and the language ideologies that link with that discussion. We first criticize the problematic notion of impact that is common in higher education policy and discuss language and impact in terms of their assumed predictable, definable, and linear nature. From there, we move on to advocate for a multimodal, multidirectional, locally, and globally relevant impact that is focused on direct engagement, participatory approaches, support for promoting community activities, and introducing more epistemologically just understandings of the relatio…

The position of Finnish and Swedish as well as other languages at universities in Finland

2015

How do Finnish and Chinese students’ diverse pedagogical experiences shape feedback interpretation?

2023

Due to the dissemination of joint degree programmes in higher education, more students from different educational backgrounds are exposed to the same teaching and assessment without sharing a common pedagogical culture. Since this is relatively new in Finland, little is known about how students with diverse backgrounds experience assessment compared to their Finnish classmates and how this affects their overall performance. Having as a starting point an English for Specific Purposes course offered in Finland and China, this qualitative study focuses on the role of feedback through seventeen in-depth interviews. Themes such as grades and peer feedback were interpreted based on the educationa…

Suomalaisten yliopistojen ja korkeakoulupolitiikan juurilla

2019

Arvio teoksesta Välimaa, Jussi. Opinteillä oppineita. Suomalainen korkeakoulutus keskiajalta 2000-luvulle. University Press of Eastern Finland. 2018. 387 s. ISBN 978-952-5934-96-0. nonPeerReviewed

Higher Education of Digitalized Accounting Benefits from Networked Cooperative Learning and Working Life Collaboration

2022

Cooperative learning is a structured way of small group working. The key elements are positive interdependence, individual accountability, promotive interaction, social skills and group processing. In this study, we create a new approach of networked cooperative learning, and examine how it contributes to the learning of digitalized accounting in real-life problem-solving cases. The interaction between digitalized accounting and cooperative learning has not been studied before. The data consist of qualitative and quantitative data. The qualitative data were gathered from group work, where accounting firms, their customers and students as well as teachers from two educational institutes work…