Browsing by Subject "export readiness"

Education is one of the newer export items in Finland. Since 2010 the Ministry of Education and Culture has published a policy document on education export every third year, providing direction for the Finnish education exporters. The policies play a part in commodifying education and increasing academic capitalism, where higher education institutions become more business-like. The aim of this study was to describe how these education export policies have evolved over time, and to find out what elements of support the policies offered to education exporters to carry out their work in practice. The research questions were: 1) How have the Finnish education export policies evolved from 2010 to 2016 concerning motives, aims and the export product?, and 2) What kind of support for conducting education export in practice do the Finnish education export policies contain? The three education export policies, 87 pages in total, were analyzed using Mayring's qualitative content analysis and the QCAmap software. The analysis showed that the education export policies have become more detailed and concrete over time. During the researched period the motives in the policies for engaging in education export were to capitalize on the existing demand for Finnish education and the good reputation of Finnish education. The aims for education export in all three policies were financial, focusing on increasing turnover from education export, and related to branding, focusing on portraying Finland and Finnish education to the rest of the world. Over time the policies have become more specific and comprehensive in depicting the education export product. In the latest policy, degree programs, various types of education, technology, and a multitude of consultancy services were depicted as export products. The three policies were found to contain 207 elements of support for exporters to carry out education export. The majority of these related to productization (64), providing advice for education exporters (47), and encouraging networking and cooperation among exporters (42). The policies reflect the political ideology of the parties ruling at the time they were written. A new trend in the latest policy is to pay attention to the individuals carrying out education export activities. For the first time rewarding and motivating these individuals is mentioned in a policy. Paying attention to the actual exporters in large organizations like higher education institutions can be expected to improve future education export performance. A concern is whether there is enough resources to implement all the support.