Article in Finnish. Some key points:
+ In Vaasa a growing number of international students from Asia are relying on food aid. In recent years the number needing help has roughly tripled.
+ At times more than 600 people per day collect food five times a week, and about one third of them are students from Asia.
+ Example: one student from Bangladesh came to Finland with her husband and two children. She has a degree from Bangladesh but found it difficult to find suitable work in Finland, especially because of Finnish language requirements.
+ Many of these students are well-educated, motivated young adults. Some are also surprised by the high cost of living in Finland especially when they have come with families.
+ "It is a relatively new phenomenon for us that students come to the country with their families, and supporting the entire family can be more expensive than expected in Finland".
+ Several students end up doing volunteer work at the food aid organizations themselves, which helps them socially and gives a sense of connection.
+ The Ministry of Education and Culture is monitoring the situation. There is a working group (ministerial) investigating the income and living conditions of international students from third countries, including potential misuse or misleading recruitment.
+ Schools have been heard by this working group, to provide insight on the problems.
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Yle just released a more detailed article in Finnish:
More and more foreign students need social assistance – a drastic change from last year
+ An increasing number of international students in Finland are having financial difficulties and are needing income support (toimeentulotuki) .
+ As of end August this year, the amount of income support paid to students with non-Finnish/foreign language backgrounds has almost reached the total paid in all of last year.
+ Foreign‐language/background students make up nearly 40% of all students receiving income support
+ The number of students coming from outside Europe is at an all‐time high, and more of them are bringing family members with them.
+ In 2022, Finland changed legislation so that non‐European students didn’t have to prove sufficient means of support after their first year of study. That is seen as one factor in the rising number of students needing support.
+ There are concerns about abuses of the student residence permit: some students might use the permit as a way to come to Finland not primarily for studies, but possibly for working.
+ A government working group is investigating the income situation of international students and their families, including potential abuses.
+ Educational institutions are considering new methods to try to ensure that incoming students are well informed and are suitable choices.
+ One issue is that some “agents” in foreign countries give misleading information to students about what life in Finland is like.
by ScientistHulk
29 comments
The thing is what led them to believe that life here is easy and cheap… who tricked them? I dont think Enter Finland lied to them?
Yay.
-Finland is way more expensive than Bangledesh.
-Your life will be hard if you don’t speak the language where you live.
These are not difficult concepts to grasp before moving.
We shouldn’t be letting students come with their families. When you have a job and can support your family, then bring them.
People often talk about how the external marketing of Finland suggests that it’s not so difficult to move here.
I’d love to see an example of that because I’m a foreigner myself and I have only ever heard that it’s a nightmare for foreigners here.
We can blame external factors and foreign organizers, but the universities and school know, and combined with Finland external marketing, it is just a big scheme, channeling money to education providers that should probably not be that big and founded differently.
Why do students need to bring in families for 1 or 2 masters year degrees? For phd it’s normal to bring in families and that’s fine.
If you bring in family one must understand it’s more expensive than an Asian coutnry plus you need to speak language.
To come to a place knowing you cannot manage it. Then going to food banks where local people who need it might get displaced is not okay. Either come alone complete your studies get a job and bring family or come with enough money to support yourself and any family your bring in.
Womp womp. Moving somewhere with no research on the job market is wild (I should know since I did that)
> “I thought I’d get a job”
Would I get a job in a relatively small Bangladesh city with no contacts and I didn’t speak a word of Bengal?
Many underestimate the value of language. One should be prepared to study and learn Finnish fluently in order to get a permanent job. If locals are struggling with finding a job, what makes you stand out and more special in comparison to be hired over them?
Some degrees studied abroad won’t transfer to local standards, so there’s also that, but I believe the language barrier is the biggest issue. They are training registered nurses in Finland in English who can’t speak Finnish or know the medical terms in Finnish. How are they supposed to treat the elderly, the biggest patient audience, who almost exclusively speak Finnish, not English?
Idk. Priorities should be evaluated before anything and local language should be one of them.
Edit: tipsy.
In some EU countries you need to put the required money to enter (around 10 000€) on a blocked account from which you will get allowances. This prevents the misuse the system where people loan money from family and return it when they have been accepted. Finland should do it too
People really do believe in magic lands, huh?
Glorified human traficking
A more detailed article released by Yle:
[https://yle.fi/a/74-20182448](https://yle.fi/a/74-20182448)
“More and more foreign students need social assistance – a drastic change from last year”
Key points added in the summary.
Cheap, lots of open jobs, no need to speak finnish = Some other country than Finland.
This was not possible 10 years ago, I wasn’t allowed to bring any family members. I have to prove to have 6800€ in my account beforehand before renew visa for the next year (every year for 4 years). Immigration laws shouldn’t have been loosened up few years ago, now more work for deportation.
Asia is huge, from east of Turkey to Indonesia are asian countries. Lumping all asian countries together is wild. Most east asians I’ve met (myself included) have/had a great time in Finland. Take it however you want, many either can speak the language or have important skills, possibly in STEM (or both).
>” I thought I’d get a job”
tee hee.
” The number of students coming from outside Europe is at an all‐time high, and more of them are bringing family members with them.”
Who the fuck is going to support those spouses if students who brought them can’t support themselves.
Seriously, permit of those spouses should be revoked and send them back until students get the job.
Yup. This is the result of Marin’s governments’ idiotic unification of students and their families.
Who would’ve thought purely socialist policies would end up with massive bills.
Don’t have means to stay? Deport them easy as that.
Same thing in Canada causing an uproar. One guy using the food bank, making videos for his fellows as a trick to get cheap/free food saying you can take as much as you want.
This happened in Canada and it had to be scaled down considerably. Them saying “I thought I would get a job” is disingenuous and there is no chance they did not know beforehand, that they would not be able to find work to support their cost of living while studying. When I graduated from TSE in 2018, something like 74% of students who graduated left the country due to employment seeking difficulties…things have only gotten worse.
People are talking about students leaving their families and kids not being humane or being bad…its not Finland’s responsibility to take in the student’s family….only the individual student applied. Studying in Finland as a non-eu foreigner is a privilege, not a right.
1. Move to the country believing they need no language and googling the average Finnish salary
2. Profit.
Not surprised at all. They do the same in Canada , Australia , Norway and so on .
**I am a former international student. This is what is happening, and it is worrying:**
1. Educational agencies primarily target middle-aged men with families by selling the idea that Finland provides free benefits for spouses and children. They also claim you can cover your living expenses through benefit money. Some people bring only 6 months to one year of backup funds. Some even search for fake spouses to help with tuition fees; the idea is that the fake spouse will pay the tuition while entering Finland as the student’s spouse. This kind of spouse advertisement is available in a Facebook group named “Bangladeshi Students in Finland,” run by group admin Abu Musa, who operates an educational agency. Due to recent backlash, the numbers of spouse ads lower these days.
2. Students have to demonstrate financial solvency. Significant students fake this through educational agencies. For example, if the student’s financial sponsor is named “XYZ,” the agency maintains good relationships with account managers in banks and, through bribes, obtains bank statements from different name same as “XYZ” persons who have money in those bank accounts. This is just one method. Another method involves bypassing Finnish immigration when entering Finland; they come through Italy or Sweden, since Finnish immigration at Vantaa Airport sometimes checks whether students have sufficient funds.
3. Some of their educational certificates are fake too. Students used to buy IELTS exam papers. Recently, authorities caught gangs that sold question papers for money. To verify this credibility, search Google for “IELTS paper leakage Bangladesh,” and you will find numerous news sources.
4. Some spouse visa holders have valid income in Bangladesh but are receiving unemployment benefits while claiming to be in integration programs.
5. Some students who don’t find any work here become so-called “educational agencies,” and the cycle continues.
Before 2022, students needed to renew their residence permits (RP) every year, and Migri checked whether one had enough funds to live and whether he or she was studying, then granted a residence permit for one year until someone graduated and found full-time work. Back then, students were not eligible for benefits. This benefit system and the new relaxed system introduced after 2022 made it easy to game the system. You probably did not hear or see in newspapers before 2022 that students were dependent on food aid.
There are genuine students whose real intention is to study, but no one can deny the number of bad actors and fraudulent practices. And do not think it is just Bangladesh; it is the same for other nations too.
The only people profiting from this are the scammers bringing/guiding them to Finland.
The people coming here, studying and bringing their husband and even children cannot find a job to support themself. Most of the time they don’t have savings to support themself for the entire study. Even if they stay and finish their study no guarantee for a job.
For the Finnish government/tax payers this is just another burden to carry, because people got lured into coming here with false pretenses.
All in all a sad story for everyone involved except the scammers.
How can anyone immigrate to a country and be surprised that you’re expected to speak the language spoken in that country?
When I was in my integration class there was a student from SE Asia who told me that before coming to Finland he thought the official language was English. So he never bothered learning any Finnish, if he even knew Finnish was a language. Of course he brought his wife and 2 kids with him as well.
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