Why Finnish School System is Tops -Strait Times

The Straits Times article on May 26,2007

Full Article pasted on Staff Welfare Notice Board (next to Poh Lean's desk)

Interesting article on education system and culture in Finland

"The Finnish education system is one of the best in the world,.... Pisa, the triennial worldwide test of the academic performance of 15-year-olds... In 2003, Finland came top in reading, literacy and science, and second in mathematics and probelm solving. Hong Kong had the next best perforamnce..."

Anybody know where we stand?

"While working in Russia some years ago, I hopped over to Helsinki .... The streets of the capital were lined with bookshops and art galleries and at the cinemas they were showing the great European and American classics, but not the latest blockbuster..."


"As I was sitting in a cafe quietly reading a shorter Solzhenitsyn, a student-type person came in and announced that she was going to read everyone her poetry, since there was a literary festival on the week."

" That Finland is a cultured place was demonstrated to me by the fact that an old gentlemen sitting nearby told her in no uncertain terms that he would rather she inflicted her adolescent gushings on someone else, as she was spoiling his lattee. She retreated hastily and left us all to our novels."

"It is easy to see why the Finns are so clever. They have more lakes than anyone else in the world. The quiet templation of still water is always conducive to thoughts and exercise of reason."

can't agreed more...about the lake :OP

"Finns enjoy nine years of compulsory, comprehensive education at a basic school... They study their mother tongue, the otehr national language, for example, Swedish or Finnish,... Whether the fact that pupils receive free hot school meals throughtout that time is significant or not, is difficult to say."

I remembered Mrs Tan SH shared something about the pupils in taiwan helping to serve their own lunch.. is it also provided by states?

"The Germans have had a similar structure for years, but they are nowhere in the Pisa tables. There must be many social and cultural factors that account for Finland success in teh Pisa competition but one of tehm is undoubtedly the quality of teaching."
"Teaching is a revered profession in Finland and there is no shortage of applicants. All teachers need to have a master's degree and less than half of the applicants are accepted onto teacher training programmes."