A story about Finland's failure to teach foreign background children Finnish is the daily Helsingin Sanomat's most popular as the week begins.
The paper talks to a Stadin AO Helsinki vocational college teacher who said that while many of her students have good — sometimes excellent English skills — many are missing basic Finnish vocabulary, even after nine years of Finnish-language comprehensive school.
According to Timo Kauppinen of the Finnish Institute for Health and Welfare (THL), the issue is socioeconomic segregation.
"When the majority of kids in some schools are from immigrant backgrounds, it impacts their literacy and language skills," he said.
The poorest language skills, according to the vocational teacher, are among those who come from family-centred cultures.
"We have students with Thai backgrounds who enrol with us and then disappear. They go to work at their parents' restaurant, and that's also what the parents want," she suggested.
At the same time, the teacher added that some kids seem to have internalised that their names already represent barriers to becoming fully fledged members of Finnish society.
"I don't want to give a voice to loudmouths or the Finns Party; I want to maintain the quality of Finnish education," she said.
Last year, a quarter of students in Helsinki's comprehensive education were non-native speakers. In Vantaa, the figure was over a third, according to HS.
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Record number of women in spring election
Women make up 42.3 percent of the candidates in next month's municipal elections. In 28 municipalities, there are more female candidates than male, according to the Association of Finnish Local and Regional Authorities.
Only once before, in 2008, has the proportion of female candidates exceeded 40 percent in a municipal election, the group's research director, Marianne Pekola-Sjöblom, told Swedish-language daily Hufvudstadsbladet.
Political parties, however, have notable differences in the proportion of female candidates. The Greens have the highest percentage of women at 61.4 percent, while the Finns Party is the most male-dominated, with only 24.5 percent female candidates.
The All Points North podcast explored why more and more foreigners in Finland are becoming politically active. Listen to the episode via this embedded player, on Yle Areena, via Apple, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts.
When Mannerheim met the Dalai Lama
Carl Gustaf Emil Mannerheim is a towering figure in Finnish history. Born under Tsarist rule, he rose through the ranks to become an officer in the Imperial Russian Army before leading the White forces in the Finnish Civil War. Later, he returned to lead Finland's armed forces during the Second World War, and then served two years as president.
Maaseudun Tulevaisuus explores a new book about the early travels of Finns in China, including Mannerheim's meeting in June 1908 with the 13th Dalai Lama, Thubten Gyatso.
"After a two-year horseback journey, Mannerheim had run out of valuables, so he gifted the Dalai Lama a FN Browning M1900 pistol. The monk was visibly excited about the weapon," said book author Juhani Mailasalo.
Four years earlier, Eugen Schauman had shot Russian Governor-General Nikolai Bobrikov in Helsinki with a similar Browning pistol.
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