Finnish School

---

Well here I am again writing my next blog. I tried uploading pictures of the Paimio sanatorium, but my internet cut out halfway through the uploading process, i'll try getting them up again today along with a few other pictures from Turku.

Well it's coming up to two months that i'll have been in Finland...and boy is it flying by. Recently i've started new lessons at my school and I've been able to experience some new things about the finnish culture. I'll first pick up where I left off in my last entry. I'll first start out with my school, Paimion Lukio (aka Paimio's High School). In lukio there are ten 45 minute periods to the day, starting at 8am with 10 minute breaks in-between each period. However there aren't usually classes in the first period so classes don't start for most students until 8:55. Every day you have a different schedule, so you might not have one class one day, but have double that class the next. For instance I don't get home until 3:45 on Mondays, but i'll get home at 2:15 on Wednesdays. The classes i'm taking right now are English 1 (I learn finnish backwards in this class, taking the english vocabulary and learning the finnish, and translating the english into Finnish), Finnish 1 (comparable to English class in high school...again I learn Finnish and some grammar), International Affairs (class where we do research on non-profit, non-government organizations, and we do community projects. My projects are on United Way and Amnesty International, plus i'll have to give a tour of the Paimio sanatorium (which is on the World Heritage preservation list) in english, so i'll have to go there and study more about the history of the building. We will also do some other smaller projects dealing with the hospital). Physics (i'm taking this class for school back home. It's hard for me because I can't understand what he says, however i can pick up some words, and last week i was able to tell that he was talking about positive and negative atoms. Other than that I'm able to translate some of the questions, and i get help translating sometimes, but I do the homework that is giving for the class...it's mostly math, so it's do-able). My last class is drama class (acting class where we learn basics of acting, and we have to put on a show at the end of the period for the school, during Independence Day). Well I think that's it for the school system, I change classes 6 times a year, so I'll be able to learn quite a bit. Before we move on I'll talk a little about the Finns and their approach to school. I believe the Finns take there classes much more seriously. Compared to back home, where I was always busy after school, and some kids didn't even do their homework until the day of class, the Finns don't do anything on school nights, unless they have a club, which would be later in the night for 2 hours,once or twice a week, so they have plenty of time to study. But then again the Finns study more because compared to the US, where we have to take the ACT and/or SAT, and it doesn't affect our admission 100%, the Finns take a huge test their senior year. It's so big in fact the the seniors get out of school 3 months before the rest of the school to study for it. The test determines if they go to college or not, and there are only a certain amount of places, so there is a lot of competition. However there are many different paths in the Finns education system, so not everyone goes to college. Some go to technical school, or others start in a specialized high school , where they will then go on to a specialized college or internship. The Finnish education system is crazy...i can post a link of the "education map" i found. Other than that college is free in Finland, and the government actually PAYS the students to go to college, and also gives them a dorm or apartment. I believe Finns can stay in college for 7 years before they have to start paying a fee to continue on.

Well that's enough on school. Some boys though don't go off to college right away because it's mandatory that all males in Finland between the ages of 19-29 have to go into the army for at least 6 months, but the army gets to decide how long you stay, but it can only be up to a year, unless you wish to get a job in the army. While in the army they only get to come home some weekends, and some holidays.

I'll continue on later...I just got called to lunch...hope you enjoyed learning a little bit about the schools, next i'll talk about my trip into Turku, and some of the things that happen there.

---