The City of Helsinki has hired seven early childhood education teachers from Spain. The teachers will start working at the City’s Swedish-language daycare centres in August.
“We are very happy about this and are looking forward to having our Swedish-language early childhood education operations strengthened by seven new teachers with robust pedagogical expertise,” comments HR Project Manager Kati Mhone.
The teachers began a six-month language course in Spain in December. The participants learn Swedish during the course, but they have also delved into Finnish early childhood education, Finnish working life and living in Finland in general.
The teachers have taken a language exam during the course. All of them have reached the language skill level set as a requirement in this recruitment process. The language course itself will continue until June.
The Finnish National Board of Education has acknowledged all participants’ qualifications, which means that they have the right to work as early childhood education teachers in Finland.
“Aside from the language exam and the acknowledgement of the teachers’ qualifications, the recruitment process has gone as usual. We have checked the teachers’ tuberculosis status and criminal records,” states Kati Mhone.
Language studies to continue in Finland
During the autumn, the teachers will continue their Swedish language studies in Finland. They will attend Swedish lessons twice a week at Arbis, which has been providing immigrants with Swedish language education for several years now.
Kati Mhone points out that language skills are not static. It is very likely that the teachers’ language skills will only improve when they start working in Helsinki.
“One of the best ways to learn a new language is to use it in working life. It is our hope that our new teachers will aim to actively improve their language skills, but as their employer, we must also make sure that they have good conditions for learning. This can be achieved through means such as providing supervisors and work communities with education on language awareness.”
The objective of the trial was achieved
The trial on hiring early childhood education teachers from Spain is one of Helsinki’s solutions to the nation-wide shortage of early childhood education teachers. The teacher shortage has hit the Swedish-language daycare centres of Helsinki particularly hard.
The objective of the trial was to hire 5–8 teachers from Spain in Finland. It would appear that this objective will be achieved, as the City has now hired seven teachers.
During the trial, the City has also developed processes for potential other foreign recruitment processes and surveyed the possibilities and limitations of hiring from abroad.
The City chose Spain because the early childhood education teacher qualification programme of Spain is very similar to that of Finland.
Furthermore, there is an oversupply of early childhood education teachers in Spain.