Browsing by Author "Koponen, Mari"

The purpose of this study was to describe and produce novel information on the special needs of general upper secondary school support. The new Act on General Upper Secondary Education obligates general upper secondary schools to provide stronger support for learning, studying and well-being. Previous research has focused more on identifying special support needs of students in general upper secondary schools. The research has been also focusing on revising the Act on General Upper Secondary Education. On the other hand, students' own views on the subject have been relatively little described. In the previous research, support received by general upper secondary school students has shown to be uneven: for example, the size of a school or regional difference have influenced access to support. This study aims to describe the support students have received, their experienced need for support, and to present the factors contributing to learning, studying, and well-being at school as narrated by students. 29 students from three general upper secondary schools in the metropolitan area of Helsinki participated in the study. The research material consisted of focus group interviews and electronic questionnaire. The students participated in both. The analysis was made by qualitative content analysis, which enabled the students' own views and experiences to show. The students who participated in the study described their received and experienced support similarly. Also, the factors described in more general terms that promote learning, studying and well-being at school were similar to these. Support for learning and studying was described with concrete examples and wishes, which were often focused on a particular school personnel. Responses to school well-being, on the other hand, emphasized the whole school community more broadly, and the wishes for a better school well-being were not always directed for certain personnel. Common to all these research results was the need for time and presence of staff, the support allocated individually, and functional information about the support possibilities to promote learning, study and well-being at school. At the same time, the importance of one's own know-how to get support was highlighted. The results of this study were in line with previous studies.