Student engagement in Finnish higher education : Conflicting realities?

Abstract

This chapter focuses on how students are engaged in Finnish higher education by describing issues related to student engagement from macro, meso and micro perspectives and highlights the fact that student engagement is more than representativeness in decision-making bodies. It presents a concrete example for each perspective. Student engagement at the macro level refers to the socio-cultural climate on student experience, which typically is created at the national level. In Finnish higher education, student engagement seems to have two layers or realities. First, at the level of representativeness, students are well engaged and students have strong voices in decision-making bodies and strategy development. Secondly, at the level of everyday practices, students are less engaged and therefore higher education institutions in collaboration with students have developed various initiatives to tackle the issues. There has been a tendency to move from external support systems to internal support models and structures of which the ePortofolio and Goodies wellbeing advisors are examples.