Finland's Green Party is proposing a major reallocation of education funding, shifting focus from an extended preschool experiment toward strengthening existing early childhood education and increasing physical learning materials in schools. The policy pivot comes directly from the results of a two-year trial on two-year preschool, which the party now acknowledges did not narrow learning gaps as intended. The Greens would finance these new proposals through state asset sales, marking a significant course correction in their education platform.
A Clear Result Forces a Change in Course
The Greens' parliamentary group held its winter meeting this week in Vantaa and Helsinki, where education was a central topic. The party had initially planned to propose making two-year preschool a permanent fixture in Finland. However, the final report from a two-year trial, launched during the previous government term and published last week by the Ministry of Education and Culture, forced a change in plans.
“Our conclusion is that instead of a two-year preschool, we now need effective targeted measures to strengthen the early childhood education of five-year-olds and the transitions between educational stages,” said Saara Hyrkkö, the Green parliamentary group's first deputy chair, in a statement.
At a press conference in Parliament, Hyrkkö explained the shift. “The key result was clear and indisputable. The two-year preschool did not narrow children's learning gaps in the way that was hoped,” Hyrkkö stated. She revealed that the original plan for the press conference just a week earlier had been to announce a push to solidify the two-year model nationwide.
New Proposals Target Early Education and School Resources
With the two-year preschool model set aside, the Greens unveiled a new set of education priorities. For early childhood education, the party proposes that a place in early education should be automatically offered to every five-year-old. The estimated cost impact of this reform would be 30 million euros.
For comprehensive schools, the Greens are advocating for support to municipalities and schools for the purchase of printed textbooks. The proposal would give every comprehensive school pupil three additional books per school year and improve school library selections. This reform carries an estimated cost of 45 million euros.
This push for more physical materials addresses an ongoing debate about digitalization in Finnish classrooms. Responding to a question at the press conference on whether digitalization has gone too far in basic education, the Greens' second deputy chair, Inka Hopsu, noted it was essential to bring digital tools into schools in the 2000s.
She argued, however, that digital learning materials should not replace paper-based ones or the practice of learning to read from physical books and write by hand. “Now we are seeking a balance, by bringing in more analog materials,” Hopsu said.
Addressing the Higher Education Bottleneck
The Greens' education package also takes aim at Finland's declining higher education attainment rate, which has now fallen below the OECD average. The party identifies a significant bottleneck in admissions as a core problem.
“If there was no pent-up demand for education, the current number of starting places would be enough for every other young person to complete a higher education degree,” Inka Hopsu said in the statement. She framed the solution as a large-scale, time-bound increase in university and university of applied sciences intake.
The Greens propose a substantial and fixed-term increase in starting places to clear the applicant backlog within the next ten years. “Clearing the applicant backlog would simultaneously be a leap towards a 60 percent higher education attainment rate,” Hopsu added.
Financing Through State Asset Sales
A critical and consistent element of the Greens' proposal is its funding mechanism. The party states that the new investments in early childhood education, school books, and higher education places would be financed by proceeds from state asset sales. This approach aligns with the party's broader fiscal policy but places the ambitious education package within a specific budgetary framework, making its realization dependent on political agreement over state-owned holdings.