VS4

The final presentation is now over, or that what I thought, since we discovered instantly that will be begin working on Educational Science already in 2 weeks. Anyway, this last virtual day on vocation science was the most interesting. I escaped the banging and dust clouds of our home-turned-into-a-construction-site to a friend's apartment for the virtual session.

First we learned about vocational education for special-needs students. According to the Review of Education in 2007  report Finland holds the world record in the quantity of special education given students in basic education (Kivirauma & Ruoho: Excellence Through Special Education? Lessons from the Finnish School Reform, p. 288). In addition, Finnish special educators have a leading status among the OECD countries (p. 289). It is a well-known fact that there is a high number of students who are not feeling well physically, emotionally, and mentally. Part of them require special attention and special education measures. For example in my lower secondary school days, there was a special group of students with poor academic performance and ill behavior, who were on so called observation class (tarkkailuluokka). I believe they had learning difficulties and some social issues, and a small group of about 6 gave them a change to get through the school system. While as a trend, children, youth, and adult not feeling well, the ultimate solution is not to have more special education. It treats the symptoms, and it is of course necessary, but the society should address the problems behind the low survival skills. Many children have to spend their afternoons alone without adult/ parental care and attention, and there is hardly anyone to share with things. In Finland independence is one of the key virtues since a baby starts learning and practicing skills, such as holding a spoon and dressing himself, so needing someone's help or attention is seen as weakness. This leads towards loneliness and even social exclusion. This is alarming especially among boys and men, who are raised to believe that showing emotions and talking about them is humiliating and should be avoided (not to mention dancing or singing). Showing emotions is allowed only in an ice-hockey match or when one is drunk. This is very sad. The society should take more measures in the well-being of its citizens, and maybe then special education would be less needed.

Satu made a great work and gave practical examples on how to approach and address this issue, when we are dealing with special-needs students. This does not only refer to disabled students, but also to ones with learning disabilities, or some other trauma or difficult conditions, which makes studying challenging.

We had a fruitful discussion on how to we can deal with special problems, such as when a student has recurring absences, tardies, or is (too) tired to study and the academic performance suffers. This brings to mind an American coed of mine when we studied abroad. The college had a mold problem but it had not been addressed efficiently. Mold was present in the library, gym, showers, and dorms. My coed had respiratory problems had missed classes because of this. The school had policy that you could only miss a few classes in order to make the credits and graduate. Because of too many absences, she had been threatened that she will not be allowed to graduate. Unfortunately the school tended to address any exception to rules by threatening this or that in order to control the students. This is one example where the issue was not addressed properly. Thankfully we are more flexible in Finland and also sensitive to all kinds of special needs, including dietary restrictions. In the same school there was another girl who had high cholesterol, but the school did not provide special diet meals for her, even though we had to pay for tuition and board, including the meals. The girl's mother had to cook her meals and she would bring them to school after each weekend.

I summary, many special situation can be handled with good communication between the teacher/tutor and the student concerned. We also discussed whether is the teacher's or student counselor's role to talk to the students and try to find solutions, and the conclusion was that both have their part to play.

Then followed a Mars presentation on combining vocation education and entrepreneurship. The Ministry of Education has outlined guidelines of entrepreneur education, and it is mandatory within the EU (Entrepreneurship Education in School in Europe: National Strategies, Curricula and Learning Outcomes, March 2012). According to this, entrepreneurship education is one of the main focuses during the current five-year period (2011-2016) (p. 46), and perhaps this is why also we as teachers-to-be also learn about this. I put together a video of our ongoing renovation project. We have two vocation students working under an apprenticeship contract, painting and putting wallpaper. There are benefits for all: the students see real-life work situations in a genuine setting and get good references from the entrepreneur. The entrepreneur gets affordable (free) labour, so they can offer construction projects in a competitive price. The client has reduced costs since the students do part of the work.

The third presentation was about entrepreneurship. We had a fun quiz, learned about key competencies, and how entrepreneurship education can be integrated into vocation teaching. This is a good background to go into EduPreneur boot camp.