Browsing by Subject "WPR"

The extension of compulsory education was the most significant education policy reform of Sanna Marin’s government. In the reform, compulsory education was extended to the age of 18 or to the completion of an upper secondary education qualification. A key objective of the extension of compulsory education was to make it possible for all young people to obtain an upper secondary qualification and thereby raise educational attainment. The aim of this thesis is to analyse the problematisations of not completing upper secondary education in the parliamentary debates on the extension of compulsory education. The aim of this thesis is also to analyse the underlying logic of the problematisations and the implications of the problematisations. The analytical framework is Bacchi's (2009) WPR policy analysis, which builds on Bacchi's definition of problematisations as the basis for political governance and the problem representations, which are contained in problematisations in a given context. The data analyzed in the thesis is the minutes of the plenary sessions related to the Government’s proposal to amend the legislation on compulsory education and some related acts (HE 173/2020 vp). Qualitative content analysis was used as the method of analysis of the data. The study identified as key concerns the risks, as expressed in the parliamentary debates, that those without upper secondary education are more likely to be out of work in the future, and are at greater risk of being excluded. The problematisations in the debates build a picture of young people who are excluded from secondary education and employment, and who are also excluded from society. The problematisations were based on the needs of the working life, which was presented in the debate as having changed and thus requiring higher levels of educational attainment. Young people were largely categorised in the debate as either being in education and employment or not. Completion of upper secondary education was presented as a key determinant of which group a young person would end up in later in life.