Finland to seek skilled labour with English curriculum

Finland will from next year offer the option to complete upper secondary education in English, after a law designed to attract skilled labour from abroad came into force Friday.

By offering education in English, the Nordic country hopes foreign skilled workers with school-aged children will be more inclined to re-locate.

The changes to the law on upper secondary education and the end-of-school exams were passed in December 2024.


English-language upper secondary education will be offered from August 2026, once the education ministry has approved curriculums submitted by education providers.

It will then be possible to sit the final-year matriculation exams in English from the autumn of 2028 onwards.

Currently, students can only sit the exams in the country's two official languages, Finnish and Swedish.

The new English version will mainly be for those lacking sufficient skills in the official languages.

Some Finnish schools already offer the International Baccalaureate Diploma Programme, an international curriculum where students focus on six subjects.

But the new English version of the matriculation examination will offer the full range of upper secondary school subjects.