Jari Lavonen, Professor of Science Education and head of department at the University of Helsinki, Finland, will be speaking about teacher education in Finland with a particular focus on teacher effectiveness and professionalism at the Oppi Festival in Helsinki this week (April 11 and 12).
Finland has a reputation for excellence in education in terms of both high quality and equal opportunities for all. Hence, organizing a global learning festival in Helsinki designed for teachers and educators to celebrate best practices in education, and bringing together 90 of the world’s leading experts from 18 different countries, makes a lot of sense, right?
That’s the hope of the organizers. The goal is that this festival will be the first in a series of international festivals in different countries for many years to come. The festival will offer workshops, presentations and discussions on the most recent themes in education, and feature top international thought leaders, including Sarah Brown, Sugata Mitra, Tony Wagner, Pasi Sahlberg, Krista Kiuru and many other well-known voices from the world of education, which we are used to featuring in The Global Search for Education.
I recently caught up with Jari while he was leading a teaching training workshop in Lima, Peru.