November 13, 2012
Foremost expert on Finnish education system to lecture Nov. 14
The foremost analyst of Finland’s education system, which consistently ranks among the top in the world in learning achievement, equity of outcomes and system efficiency, will present a public lecture from 7 to 8 p.m. Wednesday, Nov. 14 in 210 Kane Hall.
Pasi Sahlberg, director general of the National Centre for International Mobility and Cooperation in the Finnish Ministry of Education, will discuss, “Finnish Lessons: What can the United States learn from educational change in Finland?” He is on campus as a guest of the Department of Scandinavian Studies.
He has said, “The Finnish way of educational change should be encouraging to those who have found the path of competition, choice, test-based accountability, and performance-based pay to be a dead end.” He also notes that education policies in Finland are the result of “systematic, mostly intentional, development that has created a culture of diversity, trust and respect within Finnish society in general and within its education system in particular.”
Sahlberg has experience in classroom teaching, training teachers and leaders, coaching schools to change and advising education policy-makers around the world. He has worked in the United States (World Bank in Washington, DC) and Italy (European Commission). He has published over 100 articles, chapters and books, among them “The Fourth Way of Finland” (2011), “Rethinking Accountability in a Knowledge Society” (2010), “Creativity and Innovation Through Lifelong Learning (2009) and “Education Reform for Raising Economic Competitiveness” (2006). His latest book is “Finnish Lessons: What can the world learn from educational change in Finland?”
More information is available at http://www.pasisahlberg.com.
