Iida Putkonen, kohteen Oulun ylioppilaslehti tekijä

“When we’re talking about international students we need to think globally” – University of Oulu does well in Finland, but needs to do more to beat international competitors

International students are generally pretty happy with life in Oulu. According to the International Student Barometer there's still room for improvement especially when it comes to learning.

In English

TEKSTI Iida Putkonen

KUVAT Iida Putkonen

The International Student Barometer (ISB) collected in autumn 2018 provides a look into the strengths of the University of Oulu, as well as offering insight into what needs to be improved on.

The questionnaire was sent to international students last autumn. A combined 626 international degree students and exchange students from the University of Oulu answered. Questions handled learning and living in Oulu as a foreigner.

According to the results of ISB, 85 percent of international students would actively recommend the University of Oulu to others. All in all 91 percent are satisfied with all aspects of studying in Oulu.

The top reasons for applying to the University of Oulu were future career impact, country reputation and research quality. Based on the results of the survey, research is a strong point for the university: out of 212 institutions, the University of Oulu ranks fifth best in research worldwide.

What affected the choice to study in Oulu compared to other Finnish cities were the institution’s website, friends and alumni as well as current students. The institution’s website was by far the most important factor influencing the decision.

After mapping out reasons for applying, the next part of ISB measured how well the university did in reality.

Out of 212 institutions measured in ISB, the University of Oulu did well regarding learning and studies, especially within Finland. The University of Oulu was the best Finnish university when it came to work experience, marking criteria and research and ranked second in careers advice and employability.

The University of Oulu also does well in accommodation and living costs, ranking first in the world when it comes to internet in dormitories and sixth in living overall.

Vesa-Matti Sarenius, director of Academic Affairs at the University of Oulu says the questionnaire measures many things the university can’t directly affect, such as life in dormitories.

“That’s the interesting part, and the reason we have invited stakeholders along. We are working with the city of Oulu as well as Business Oulu and PSOAS (student housing) because there are things we at the university can’t do but can ask others for help.”

Sarenius says that the city of Oulu has been invited to hear the results of the ISB in the past two years, and has taken their part in welcoming international students very seriously.

In terms of facilities, the University of Oulu and Finland are among the best in the world. Globally the University of Oulu ranks fifth in technology and sixth in laboratories. The university was the third best in both technology and laboratories within Finland, so a fair amount of the competition is local.

Vesa-Matti Sarenius isn’t satisfied with just doing well within Finland.

“When we are talking about international students we need to think globally. An international student won’t compare their experiences in two universities within Finland.”

Sarenius sees global comparison as the point of improvement for the university – and the numbers agree. Although the University of Oulu does well within Finland, there are areas where the institution falls short globally.

Out of 212, Oulu ranked at 153 in quality lectures and 151 in good teachers. Even the positive numbers look less flattering globally. Even though University of Oulu is second best in Finland in employability, it is the 127th when compared worldwide.

What now?

After hearing the results, Sarenius wants to keep growing.

“It’s good that we have these number one spots, but we need to look at where we can improve. That’s why we conduct the ISB.”

He sees improvement as the main goal of conducting the survey, and aims for long-term improvements of the university.

Anu Ylitalo, Solution Designer for Academic Affairs at the University of Oulu, underlines the importance of the survey as a way for students to change how things are done.

“Students can really impact things. These results and findings will be analyzed in the different faculties.”

She also says the survey included open questions that have yet to be analyzed. These will further aid in addressing specific issues students might be experiencing in Oulu.

The ISB is an annual survey that was answered by 195,182 international students from 212 institutions in 21 different countries. The survey was sent to bachelor’s, master’s and PhD students. The response rate at the University of Oulu was 41 percent.

Julkaistu 18.4.20191.2.2023

Iida Putkonen

Oulun ylioppilaslehden entinen päätoimittaja. Tiedeviestinnän maisteri ja glögin ympärivuotinen kuluttaja. Etsii revontulia, riippumattoja ja juuri oikeita sanoja.

Lue lisää:

Hi, 5 ways to get your voice heard

As individuals, we may feel like our voice is a single grain of sand on a vast beach. However, we must not forget that politics is just people, and we could have the power to affect decision-making. One of your main tools for using your power is voting in elections. Here are 5 more ways in which you can empower yourself and influence political change.

In English

TEKSTI Marcelo Goldmann

Write opinion pieces

An opinion piece is a small essay in which you present an informed opinion and use your knowledge and credible sources to defend your stance. You can write a blog and share it with your peers through social media. Presenting your opinion succinctly and defending your position with knowledge on the subject will also help you feel empowered.

Contact a member of the parliament

Finland has a parliamentary system, thus the power to make and execute laws is centered at the parliament. You could get your voice heard by for example contacting the Chairperson of the Environment Committee and asking about the actions the Committee is taking toward decreasing greenhouse gases in Finland. You can find contact information of the MPs at eduskunta.fi. Make sure to do your homework beforehand to make an informed, polite, and concise question.

Join a student organization

If you have no experience in politics and want to gain some experience, you can start in your school. By joining a student political organization like Keskustanuoret and Vihreät nuoret, you can get the small-scale experience of being the change you want to see. You could join the Student Representative Council and have an impact on student matters. The Student Council elections (edarivaalit) are coming up this autumn.

Join a political party

Now that you have gained some political experience, you can join a party which aligns with your convictions. Whether it’s the green party, the left, or right party, you will find a political party in which you can gain more experience and understand how politics work in Finland. If your ideas are too groundbreaking for existing parties, you can form your own. You will need to register your party and present the appropriate documentation, including 5000 signatures from supporters who are eligible to vote.

Run for office

If you’re highly politically motivated and want to make a change from the inside, what better way than getting into Finnish politics. A political career is challenging, but through hard work, motivation, and a bit of fortune, you can join the City Council, the Parliament, become Prime Minister, or President.

PS. It may seem like an impossible task to get into politics. However, decision-makers are just people like you and I. You could be one of them.

Julkaistu 11.4.20191.2.2023

Marcelo Goldmann

A Doctor of Chemical Engineering from the University of Oulu. "Life is like a rubber duckie, you gotta keep it afloat to see its splendor." Instagram: @marcelogman

Lue lisää:

Hi, 5 ways to improve your Finnish

Let's be honest: learning Finnish is hard. And as Finns themselves will tell you: Finnish is not even that useful worldwide. However, as students and expats living in Finland, we want to integrate and be able to share the language and experiences as a Finn would. Granted, there are prodigies which were blessed by the Kalevalan magical artifact Sampo that can speak fluent Finnish within a year. For the rest of us mortals, the path to go beyond Terve and Kiitos is a long, arduous one. The following 5 ways to improve your Finnish will hopefully help you on this language adventure as they have helped yours truly.

In English

TEKSTI Marcelo Goldmann

Get in the proper mindset

Learning Finnish will not be automatic (unless you’re one of the prodigies mentioned above). You have to first understand that learning a language requires effort, practice, and curiosity. Yes, it’s extra work, but if you like the Finnish language, it will be work that will bring you great pleasure. Because Finnish is not your mother tongue, the path to fluency will be challenging, but you’re not the first person to learn it nor will you be the last. You’re not alone.

An apple a day

They say “An apple a day keeps the doctor away”. This might not be strictly true, but what is true is that with everything, practice makes perfect. If you don’t have a chance to practice Finnish very often, at least try learning a new word every day and using it in a sentence. Another option is to watch Finnish programs on TV. It’s very challenging at first, but as the days add up, you will start understanding more and more.

Don’t be afraid to make mistakes

Most people will be flattered that you want to speak their language. Even if you make mistakes when speaking or writing, do your best to be understood. In the end, the most basic purpose of language is moving information from your head to the other person’s head. If you succeed at this, even with less-than-perfect grammar, you will be one step closer to mastering the language.

Be proud of your progress

No one will be as harsh on you than yourself. Be proud of all the little progress you make in your Finnish. It’s not only important to work hard and practice; you should also pat yourself in the back every time you have a successful conversation or manage to solve a situation which requires the Finnish language.

Don’t give up

In Finland, it is very easy to be “lazy” and default to the lingua franca English. Most Finns have at least a rudimentary understanding of English and you will be able to survive in most scenarios with just that. Especially after you have learned the basics of Finnish, the difficulty curve will rise exponentially and you will be tempted to give up because “it’s just too hard” or you “just don’t have time”. Everything that’s worth it requires work and effort. If you want to learn Finnish, just keep practicing and don’t stop; you will find yourself, without even noticing it, speaking more and more Finnish without having to interject with English or “Finnglish”.

Julkaistu 9.4.20191.2.2023

Marcelo Goldmann

A Doctor of Chemical Engineering from the University of Oulu. "Life is like a rubber duckie, you gotta keep it afloat to see its splendor." Instagram: @marcelogman

Lue lisää:

The moving tradition continues: This year Vulcanalia evening festival will be held at Club Teatria

The Student Union of the University of Oulu’s annual start of the academic year party Vulcanalia is getting a new location, yet again. This coming Vulcanalia might be the last of its kind.

In English

TEKSTI Iida Putkonen

KUVAT Antti Törmä

In Finnish.

Oulu university students’ academic year opens in Limingantulli this year.

The evening party known as Vulcanalia Festival, which opens the academic year of Oulu University students will be held on Wednesday September 11th at Club Teatria, says Oulu Student Union’s event producer and community specialist Asta Salomaa.

The board of the Student Union decided on the new location in their meeting on the 21st of February.

Last year the evening party was moved to an indoors location to Areena Oulu. The reason behind the move was the Student Council’s decision to move the event indoors. This time the location is changing once again, but for a different reason.

The organizers thought Vulcanalia worked out well at Areena Oulu. The reason for the move was not that they were not satisfied, but the desire to organize an even bigger event.

“Teatria can fit twice the amount of people. Since it is the opening event of the year, we want as many people as possible to be able to experience it”, Salomaa says.

Last year the tickets to the evening party were sold out before the event, so there is demand for additional tickets.

There are a few added reasons to choosing Club Teatria beyond additional tickets and an indoors location. Teatria has good light and sound technology and its own coat and bar services that help organize the event, Salomaa says.

Teatria is a familiar place to friends of concerts. It closed its doors for five years, but the renewed Club Teatria held its opening event in November last year.

The annual Vulcanalia student fair will be held at the Linnanmaa campus as usual.

The last Vulcanalia?

Vulcanalia is being organized for the 25th time this year, and as the Oulu University of Applied Sciences move is edging closer, there are rumours of this being the last year the party will be held.

Is this the last Vulcanalia of its kind?

“To that I have to say: maybe! It likely is the last Vulcanalia because we will hold an opening party with Osako (the student union of the Oulu University of Applied Sciences) in the future. There are no papers signed on that yet, though”, Salomaa answers.

According to Asta Salomaa the anniversary of Vulcanalia means an even bigger event: “This year we will have the biggest artists we have ever had, I can say that much!”

Last year the performers at the evening event were Teekkaritorvet, Satellite Stories and Stig.

This year’s performers will be revealed in August. Salomaa is preparing the choices for artists and the board of the Student Union will make the executive decisions on performers.

Salomaa is not able to predict the cost of tickets quite yet, but she promises that they are aiming to keep the prices “as student-friendly as the previous years”.

Honor to traditions

Vulcanalia moving has nearly become its own tradition, as the event has moved every year since 2014. Since then the party has been seen in front of Ouluhalli, inside Ouluhalli, on the 2T parking lot of Linnanmaa, and lastly in Areena Oulu.

It is only fitting that the event ends in yet another location change.

“The fact that the possibly last Vulcanalia moves yet another time is the only logical solution. For others it’s tradition to always stay in the same spot, but for us it appears the tradition is to change places every year”, Salomaa laughs.

The first Vulcanalia was arranged in front of restaurant Rauhala in 1995. The event was organized in front of Rauhala until the year 2003, when it was moved to Kuusisaari. In 2012 the event moved from Kuusisaari to Möljä in Toppila.

In previous years Vulcanalia has seen performers such as Anssi Kela, Felix Zenger, Tuomas Kauhanen, Moses Hazy, Redrama, Kauko Röyhkä ja Musta Barbaari.

While you wait for more news regarding Vulcanalia, you can reminisce last year’s party by browsing through Antti Törmä’s photo gallery from the event.

Julkaistu 27.3.20191.2.2023

Iida Putkonen

Oulun ylioppilaslehden entinen päätoimittaja. Tiedeviestinnän maisteri ja glögin ympärivuotinen kuluttaja. Etsii revontulia, riippumattoja ja juuri oikeita sanoja.

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The ABCs of employment: how Löyly aims to help international students find jobs

Löyly is bringing students and companies together for the second year in a row. The event organizers Katariina Sarja and Asta Salomaa tell us which questions the two-day employment event aims to answer.

In English

TEKSTI Iida Putkonen

KUVAT Antti Törmä

International students want to know about practical things regarding finding a job, says Katariina Sarja. She’s the project coordinator of Löyly, a two-day employment event meant for both international and non-international students in Oulu.

In order to answer the questions the Löyly team conducted a survey. Team members were surprised to find most of the students’ questions were quite basic.

“Last year we didn’t realize to focus on such concrete things. This year we have a workshop for how to find job listings to begin with”, says Asta Salomaa, the event producer and community specialist for Student Union of University of Oulu (OYY).

“Based on the feedback we received, basic information and job listings are not easily accessible”, Sarja says.

One of the biggest questions international students asked was about the language barrier. They want to know how well you really need to know Finnish in order to get a job in Finland.

Cultural differences are also on many students’ minds, although Sarja says Löyly’s keynote speakers think in reality cultural differences are often not such a big deal at the workplace.

Based on feedback from last year, Löyly has adjusted and aims to answer more concrete questions international students might have.

“For example, this year we have a person from the public employment services coming to talk about everything, starting with taxes. The workshop is an ABC in how to start looking for a job”, Sarja says.

Other, more abstract questions like cultural differences will be addressed in the keynotes. Topics vary from integrating to the workplace to how Finnish people seem to foreigners on the outside.

More job openings, more internships

Löyly is being organized for the second time this year. Salomaa, who organized the event also last year, says the first Löyly was a success.

“The feedback from both participants and companies after the first event was positive. They felt this event was truly needed”, Salomaa says.

Bringing employment opportunities to international students isn’t only Löyly’s goal. The Ministry of Education and Culture published a vision for Finnish higher education and research in 2030 in October 2017. The Roadmap for Implementing Vision 2030 also outlines international students’ integration as one of its future education goals.

The Ministry’s aim is to add more support and opportunities for internships, goals that Löyly shares.

“We want to awaken employers to see if they could post more job openings in English and offer more opportunities for internships”, Salomaa says.

Joining forces with OSAKO

Löyly 2019 is a two-day event, held in two campuses: the first day takes place at the University of Oulu on 18th March, the second at the Oulu University of Applied Sciences on 19th March.

This year’s event also has a new added factor: OSAKO, the Student Union of Oulu University of Applied Sciences.

Salomaa explains that the original concept for the event was a collaboration between OYY and OSAKO, but due to personnel changes OSAKO could not participate the first time around.

“Last year we got together with OSAKO and discussed what challenges international students face. We came to the conclusion that it doesn’t matter which school you attend, the challenges are the same”, Salomaa says.

To prove this point, the program for both days of Löyly are nearly identical, the only difference being in the key speakers. At both campuses the speakers are graduates of the schools respectively.

“We wanted to bring alumni to speak about how your career path can progress from the studies of the school”, Sarja explains.

The Löyly team also added more workshops to the event due to their high demand last year.

What’s next for Löyly?

Regarding Löyly’s future, Salomaa has a dream.

“I want to prove that the concept works in two different schools, so why not bring it to others as well? My goal is to make Löyly into an event concept package that you could bring into any university, because each one faces the same challenges.”

In a matter of weeks Salomaa is going to pitch the Löyly event concept to other student unions. She hopes that other universities will also want to invest in the employment of international students.

Löyly 2019 employment event is organized by the Student Union of the University of Oulu (OYY) and Student Union of Oulu University of Applied Sciences (OSAKO) together with Business Oulu and Talent Attraction, Business Kitchen, University of Oulu and Oulu Entrepreneurship Society. The event takes place at the University of Oulu on 18th March and at the Oulu University of Applied Sciences on 19th March. The event consists of workshops, keynotes and panel discussions, which will take place in Linnanmaa campus’ Tellus Innovation Arena and at the Kotkantie campus’ main lobby and its surroundings respectively. Check out the whole schedule on Löyly’s website.

Julkaistu 14.3.20191.2.2023

Iida Putkonen

Oulun ylioppilaslehden entinen päätoimittaja. Tiedeviestinnän maisteri ja glögin ympärivuotinen kuluttaja. Etsii revontulia, riippumattoja ja juuri oikeita sanoja.

Lue lisää:

Hi, 5 Failed Future Predictions

It was printed in Popular Mechanics 1949 that future computers would weigh less than 1.5 tons. Well, computers nowadays can be smaller than a coin. Other predictions have not come true, such as the following five.

In English

TEKSTI Marcelo Goldmann

Hoverboards

Popularized in the 1989 film Back to the Future II, the iconic hoverboard has eluded us for almost 20 years. There have been prototypes such as the Hendo hoverboard, but sadly, they are not feasible for transportation. It is unlikely that we will ever get to see the kind of hoverboard that allows us to travel on any surface.

Flying cars

While we indeed have air transportation (see: planes), we might never get to have our own flying cars. The reason is not impossibility but logistics. We can barely manage with ground traffic, noise, accidents, and regulations. It would be highly dangerous to have two-ton machines of death flying above our heads.

Time Travel

Time travel was popularized by the 1895 novel The Time Machine by H.G. Wells. Since then, we have dreamed of traveling to the past to correct mistakes or to obtain information. Sadly, although theoretically time travel to the future is possible (traveling at the speed of light), traveling to the past is not even theoretically possible. Even if traveling to the past were possible, we don’t have a frame of reference of how the universe moves, so even jumping one-second to the past could leave you floating somewhere in the orbit of Jupiter.

Human interstellar travel

This point is more about our mortality than our technology. We do have the technology to launch things to space and even have them move for a very long time. We have sent probes to Mars, and we may one day send humans as well.

However, the distances become astronomical very quickly. The center of our own galaxy Milky Way is about 26 thousand light-years away, to which we would have to travel at the speed of light for 26 thousand years to reach.

The end of the world

Every time someone has said the world would end, it didn’t. Make no mistake, the world will one day end. It’s just a matter of when and how. But don’t be discouraged, the Earth will most likely still be standing long after humanity has gone extinct.

Julkaistu 27.2.20191.2.2023

Marcelo Goldmann

A Doctor of Chemical Engineering from the University of Oulu. "Life is like a rubber duckie, you gotta keep it afloat to see its splendor." Instagram: @marcelogman