Pupils in Swedish-language schools choose English and German over Finnish
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A decision by the west coast city of Kokkola to cut back on teaching of the Finnish language in Swedish-language schools is a cause for concern for those who put a high priority on the bilingual character in Finland.
Up to now, Finnish has been mandatory from the third grade onwards. Now third-graders in Kokkola are to be offered either English or German. Under current plans Finnish is to be an elective subject, beginning in the fourth grade.
In practice, all fourth-graders in Swedish-language schools in Kokkola take Finnish; even though it is nominally an elective, Finnish is mandatory for all practical purposes, because there are no options. However, Risto Aalto, head of the city’s Education Department, believes that the elective nature of the subject undermines the status of Finnish in the city.
Kirsi Lindroos, the director-general of the National Board of Education says that the policy in Kokkola is unusual, but legal. Local authorities are free to set school language curricula as long as the second domestic language (Finnish or Swedish, as the case may be) is offered at the upper level of comprehensive school at the latest.
Erik Gerber of the Swedish-language education section of the National Board of Education takes a sceptical view of the insistence among municipal authorities in Kokkola who say that most of the children have quite a good knowledge of Finnish, and that the current level of Finnish-language education in the city’s Swedish-language schools is excessive.
All Swedish-language schools in Helsinki and Espoo have Finnish starting in the third grade.
"I think that it is very important that the second domestic language is the first foreign language", says Barbro Högström, head of the department of Swedish-language schools in Espoo.
Helsingin Sanomat
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| 8.4.2005 - TODAY |
 Pupils in Swedish-language schools choose English and German over Finnish
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