Inclusion and Special Needs Support for Immigrant Students in Finland    

• In Event: Inclusion and Special Needs Education for Immigrant Students in the Nordic Countries

Abstract

Research shows that immigrant students are overrepresented in special needs education (SNE) and often misdiagnosed with learning disabilities when they, in fact, not yet are proficient in the language of instruction and assessment. The focus of this presentation is the intersection of SNE and education for students with immigrant background in Finland. The aim is to analyze how the Finnish compulsory education supports immigrant students and how, and if, the current structures of inclusion and educational support meet the special education needs of immigrant students. Further the objective is to explore why immigrant students do not perform academically as well as non-immigrant peers.
We describe the education system in Finland and educational support available for immigrant students from a social justice perspective (Gorski 2016; Gorski & Dalton, 2020). The aim of education in Finland is to provide equal opportunities and equal access to education free of charge for everyone regardless of gender, ethnic origin, age, ability, and place of residence (Basic Education Act 628/1998). This includes a three-tiered support system according to each student’s needs (FNAE, 2014a; 2014b; 2022). However, immigrant students do not achieve as well as non-immigrant peers (Harju-Luukkainen & McElvany, 2018) despite their positive educational aspirations (Holmberg et al., 2018), and policies promoting educational support and inclusion.
The methodological part consists of a qualitative policy analysis (Einbinder, 2010) of documents and Education Acts such as the Basic Education Act (628/1998), Act on ECEC (540/2018) and the Act on Compulsory Education (1214/2020) as well as the national core curricula and policy documents stating the educational support for immigrant students. Research conducted in Finland on educational support, including S2, preparatory education and the three-tiered support for learning and schooling were also analyzed. A total of 17 policy documents and 32 studies and reports were analyzed.

The analysis shows that many aspects relating to policy and practice of immigrant students, such as preparatory education and S2 instruction are in place, and the three-tiered support system provide additional support. However, the structures and current measures are not enough to support fully the inclusion and learning of immigrant students with special needs. The reasons for immigrant students’ poorer academic performances are complex but deficits in preparatory education and S2 instruction combined with inadequate teaching material and language tests are contributing factors. These shortfalls affect the possibilities for immigrant students to develop the language proficiency needed for further learning and studies.
This analysis identifies aspects in the Finnish educational system that do not support students with immigrant background to reach their full academic potential. The review of the literature also show that teachers are unsure of how to teach students in linguistically and culturally diverse classrooms (Harju-Autti & Sinkkonen, 2020), that there is a lack of well-developed pedagogical practice on language support (Harju-Autti et al., 2018). More research is needed in Finland on teaching immigrant students (Vigren et al., 2022). For a change to happen, this topic also needs to be addressed in teacher education programs.

Authors

• Monica Londen, University of Helsinki

• Gunilla Holm, University of Helsinki

• Minna Törmänen, University of Teacher Education in Special Needs