English-language upper secondary education in Finland has begun for the first time under the country’s national curriculum, with students starting classes this week in Helsinki, Vantaa, Tampere, Jyväskylä, Oulu and Pori. The reform allows eligible students to complete the entire Finnish general upper secondary programme in English and, from 2028, take the national matriculation examination in the same language.
The change creates a new route through Finland’s lukio, or general upper secondary school system. It is aimed primarily at young people already living in the country whose Finnish or Swedish is not yet strong enough for upper secondary studies, rather than at students moving to Finland specifically to study in English.
According to Yle, Espoo is expected to introduce the programme in 2027, expanding the initial network beyond the six cities where teaching began in August 2026.
English enters the Finnish national upper secondary curriculum
The programme is different from the International Baccalaureate, which Finnish schools have long been able to offer in English.
Instead, students follow the same national curriculum used in Finnish- and Swedish-language general upper secondary schools. The Finnish National Agency for Education says the English version is based on the same content as the Finnish and Swedish curricula, allowing students to study the full range of subjects available in the national system.
A Finnish lukio normally lasts about three years and leads to the national matriculation examination. Students complete at least 150 credits, with the qualification providing eligibility to apply for higher education in Finland and abroad.
The first students following the new English-language curriculum are expected to take their matriculation examinations from autumn 2028. The examinations will cover the same content as those taken in Finnish and Swedish.
Students completing the English-language route will still have to study Finnish or Swedish. According to Yle, the qualification requires a module in one of the two national languages as a second language.
English-language education is also an immigration policy
The reform has a broader purpose than changing the language used in classrooms. When the legislation was prepared, Finnish authorities explicitly connected it to the country’s efforts to attract international skilled workers and encourage Finnish emigrants to return with their families.
The Finnish National Agency for Education said the reform is intended both to improve access to education for students with insufficient Finnish or Swedish and to strengthen Finland’s attractiveness to international professionals and returnees.
That addresses a practical problem for internationally mobile families. A parent may be able to work in Finland in English while their teenage children face a much higher linguistic threshold when entering a general upper secondary school.
Until now, an English-speaking student seeking an academic upper secondary education could consider options such as an IB programme, but that meant following an international curriculum rather than Finland’s national one. The new system allows students to remain within the Finnish educational structure while studying its content in English.
It also marks a notable adjustment for a school system traditionally organised around Finnish and Swedish, Finland’s two national languages. English is not replacing either of them, but is being introduced as an additional language through which a Finnish upper secondary qualification can be completed.
Who can study at a Finnish upper secondary school in English
Access is deliberately restricted. The reform is intended for students whose Finnish or Swedish skills are insufficient for completing upper secondary studies in those languages.
The Finnish National Agency for Education also specifies that the programme is not designed as a route for students from outside Finland who move to the country solely to attend an English-language upper secondary school.
At Aviapolis Upper Secondary School in Vantaa, where one of the first classes has started, Yle reported that the English track is open to students who have attended a Finnish school for less than three years.
For students such as Aakash Gamage, who moved from Sri Lanka to Finland less than two years ago and completed ninth grade in a Finnish school, the change removes a substantial barrier. He told Yle that studying in Finnish had been difficult and that he expected learning in English to make his studies easier.
Another student, Eoghan Donnelly, who moved to Finland after attending school in the United Kingdom, said that without the new option he would first have had to learn Finnish sufficiently well before pursuing the academic route he wanted.
The first challenge is finding textbooks in English
The reform has only just begun, so the first classes are too small and too new to provide evidence about its educational results. One practical difficulty, however, has already emerged: teaching materials designed specifically for the Finnish curriculum are scarce in English.
Juho-Kustaa Mäkinen, who teaches history, social studies and ethics at Aviapolis, told Yle that publishers have so far shown limited interest in producing dedicated English-language versions of Finnish upper secondary materials.
He has consequently translated existing material himself and supplemented it with English-language media and other sources.
The problem illustrates one of the consequences of creating a third instructional language for a curriculum previously delivered mainly in Finnish and Swedish. Translating the official curriculum establishes what students should learn, but schools still need textbooks, exercises and other teaching resources written for those courses.
For Finland, the first English-language lukio classes therefore represent both an educational experiment and part of a wider question about internationalisation. The country is trying to make it possible for internationally mobile families to enter its national institutions without requiring their children to master Finnish or Swedish immediately, while continuing to make those languages part of their education.
The first significant test will come in 2028, when students are able to sit Finland’s matriculation examination in English for the first time.
