Browsing by Author "Passoja, Jenni"

The aim of this study was to explore how student selection in higher education construct in discussion in the opinion pieces of Helsingin Sanomat from the perspective of equality of opportunity. The discussion of the reform in student selection of higher education has been active for a long time, but the future reform has caused more discussion. There has been many studies about segregation of the Finnish education system at the level of comprehensive school, but there is not that many studies about student choice in higher education. Therefore, it is necessary to study of the student selection also in higher education from the perspective of equality of opportunity. Theoretical framework of this study is based on equality of opportunity. First I describe the study with the development of the Finnish higher education system and execution of the student selection. I consider equality of opportunity in this study as an equal opportunity for an individual to participate in the student choice of the university. The data has been collected from Helsingin Sanomat and it consists of 57 opinion pieces published between January 2015 and October 2017. The data was analyzed by discourse analysis which is based on tradition of social constructionism. Three different kind of discourse from the perspective of equality of opportunities found in the study were: equal opportunities to make choices, choice creating inequality and responsibility of individual. Education occurred in every discourse as an opportunity to social mobility and it was highly appreciated. The discourse of equal opportunities and the discourse of creating inequality emphasized the welfare state discourse, as in the discourse of responsibility of individual was an emphasize to neoliberalism discourse. Based on the conclusions, a need for a study on the transition from the secondary school to higher education can be presented and also the need for a study on does the equality of opportunity materialize in the transition to higher education.