News
| 02.09.2022

Opening of the academic year 2022: “Hanken is to be a frontrunner in attracting and integrating foreign students in the Finnish society”

Rektor Ingmar Björkman vid talarpodiet på inskriptionen 2022
“Hanken aims to contribute with a much larger number of foreign citizens coming to Finland and being integrated into Finnish working life”, said Rector Ingmar Björkman at the opening of the academic year at Hanken School of Economics on 1 September 2022.

According to Ingmar Björkman, the fundamental question is why an international student would choose Hanken in Finland.

“To be successful, Hanken must be able to offer a portfolio of excellent educational programs to its prospective students.”

In order to integrate foreign students in Finland, it will also be essential to offer internships that the students can access already during their studies.

“Here I turn to the companies and organisations that have a close relationship with Hanken. My hope is that these could generously offer summer internships to the foreign knowledge workers that our country is in such great need of in the future.”

Christoph Vitzthum, the chair of the Hanken board, also highlighted the exchange students in his speech.

“Surveys show that Hanken's exchange students are satisfied with their time here, extremely so in fact. We want to attract even more degree students to Hanken, so we have to make sure that our international education programmes are attractive enough. Today we also have more students from Sweden than ever before, and even more are warmly welcome”, said Christoph Vitzthum.

Despite the fact that Rector Ingmar Björkman in his speech highlighted the importance of increasing the proportion of foreign students at Hanken, he reminded of the very important national responsibility Hanken has to train Swedish speaking economists for the Finnish society.

“This responsibility is absolutely central to us at Hanken and will remain so.”

In connection with the opening of the academic year, the rector awarded the Hanken School of Economics’ medal, which was founded in 1953. This year, bronze medals were awarded in recognition of 25 years of service to university lecturer Jan Antell in Helsinki and professor Petri Mäntysaari and lecturer Christian Johansson in Vaasa.

Hanken School of Economics now began its 114th academic year in Helsinki and its 43rd academic year in Vaasa.