The Finnish educational community at the time of COVID-19, perceptions and experiences

The spread of the pandemic and the interruption of face-to-face lessons, which have given way to distance learning, have introduced challenges and new opportunities for educational institutions, school principals, teachers, students and their families. With the aim of outlining the response of the Finnish education and training system and the stakeholders involved in it to the emergency circumstances, this contribution wants to investigate how the Finnish education community has responded to the events of spring 2020, how is it responding now and what was the starting point before the pandemic. Through a documentary analysis on the studies conducted in Finland starting from March 2020 and on the data coming from the international context, it want to analyze if and to what extent Finnish schools were prepared for digital learning, what was the technological preparation of teachers as well as what is their point of view and that of students and families (Ahtiainen et al., 2021, 2020; Koskela et al., 2020; OECD, 2021, 2020c, 2019a). In a delicate moment like this, taking into consideration the point of view of those who have lived and are experiencing school closely can be a good way to overhaul on what may be the points on which to reflect in order to better construct the school of the postpandemic future (Sahlberg, 2021ab).