Redefining Adolescent Learning: A multi-level longitudinal cohort study of adolescent learning, health, and well-being in educational transitions in Finland

Education and learning as well as health and well-being of school-aged children have strong research traditions. Despite the close interaction of the two at learning outcomes and educational transitions, the fields have been largely studied separately and their approaches have been different. In our Consortium, the main objective is to disclose the factors and processes affecting students’
learning, competence-building, health, and well-being from the end of primary education to the end of upper secondary education, and the role of these factors at different action levels: individual, class, school, and municipal policy. Thus far, research on the complex mechanisms leading to different educational outcomes during lower and upper secondary education is scarce. The Consortium brings together expertise in two domains, learning and educational outcomes, and adolescent health and educational health differences. The
Consortium will deepen our understanding of these intertwined mechanisms, and through comparing students’ developmental paths in different schools and classes offer examples of school-level practices to help students’ successful transition from lower to upper secondary education.
The project follows a cohort of 12 000 children from the beginning of lower secondary education (age 12–13) to the end of the upper
secondary school (age 18–19) in the 14 municipalities of the Helsinki Metropolitan Region. The data comprises individual level data
and independent aggregated school-level data. Part of data (surveys, registry data) has been collected earlier at 2011 and 2014 and third
survey and registry data will be collected during the proposed phase of the study. Multilevel and mixed-modelling methods will be used
to define for each research question the most appropriate level of focus from the individual student to the school, to best capture the
factors involved in the processes governing students’ learning and well-being at school, and predicting their successful path to adulthood.