Expanding Education and Improving Odds? Participation in Higher Education in Finland in the 1980s and 1990s

Abstract

This article focuses mainly on the key results of research on the differences in participation in higher education in Finland in the 1980s and 1990s. The recent discussion surrounding the methods of measuring participation in higher education is also considered. The results show that, in 1980, the odds for children of the well educated participating in higher education was 13 times greater than that of children of fathers with only a basic level of education. Since then, the trend has decreased slowly from 12 in 1985 to 10 in 1995. Despite the various egalitarian policy measures applied by the State, the difference in participation, indicated by the odds ratio 10, is still enormous, and the actual situation for youth with poor family backgrounds has not changed during the past decades. The persistent inequality of educational opportunity in relative terms revealed by the odds ratio, which the authors argue to be the appropriate measure for changes over time, is analysed further by exploring regional differences and the differences between various fields of study. It is shown that the real competition for higher education is among the well off. This is illustrated by a metaphor from bicycle racing: even if the tail-end cyclists reach the main pack, the front-runners widen their gap between the main pack.

Labour Market Influence on Recruitment to Higher Education – Gender and Class Perspectives

“…A special 'room' was created, which is in accordance with a principle expressed as 'add women, but don't stir' (Hirdman 2003, p. 182). Kivinen and his co-workers have in several articles (Kivinen and Rinne 1991, 1996, 1998a, 1998bKivinen and Ahola 1999;Kivinen et al 2001) discussed the consequences of mass education for higher education and for the students. Particularly in periods of unemployment, the educational institutions get a function similar to a waiting room.…”

“…Women dominate the shortest programmes with a clearly pronounced vocational focus, while men still keep their lead within prestigious programs (Egerton and Halsey 1993;Gustafsson et al 2000;Tegner 2002). Students from the middle class dominate all educational institutions, but the domination is less pronounced within universities outside the largest cities, and within colleges (Egerton and Halsey 1993;Kivinen et al 2001).…”

An equity perspective on access to, enrolment in and finance of tertiary education

“…See further OECD (2001b), Biffl and Isaac (2002), Blöndal et al (2002, Table 6) and Clancy and Goastellec (2007) for an overview of selected country-specific evidence, and e.g. Kivinen et al (2001) for Finland, Barbaro (2003) for Germany, Opheim (2004) for Norway, Holzer (2006) for Sweden, Galindo-Rueda et al (2004) and Machin and Vignoles (2004) for the UK. Similar overall patterns already emerged among the eight European countries that participated in the corresponding survey for the year 2000.…”

An Action-oriented Critical Pedagogical Theory

“…According to the founders of the Finnish elementary school, education was to be seen as a tool for maintaining national identity, literacy, and political freedom (e.g., Cygnaeus 1910). In the 1960s, the educational system in Finland was reevaluated following the ideology of equality of educational opportunities, producing, for instance, comprehensive school systems and a considerable increase in the number and availability of institutions of higher education (Kivinen, Ahola, & Hedman, 2001). At the end of the 1980s, educational administration was decentralized in the Finnish society to improve the quality of education by increasing flexibility and by introducing new evaluation mechanisms.…”