Looking firmly ahead

Arcada has every reason to be proud of both students and staff. They also deserve heartfelt thanks for their efforts under the current trying circumstances.

The research projects at Arcada also had some important achievements with socially relevant projects initiated during the year. One of them, for instance, looks at the question of using social robots in health care while another project is designed to develop algorithms for dialect recognition. Both projects will contribute to solving challenges in the hard-pressed health care sector of this country. They create and test solutions that makes the interaction with supporting technology easy and pleasant for health care professionals. I encourage you to look up Highlights 2021 for more examples of our projects. All the projects contribute to smart solutions for a sustainable future and a dynamic career, precisely as intended in Arcada’s strategy.

Successful degree programmes

Our contributions to the Swedish culture sphere in Finland were also significant, with a number of Arcada productions receiving awards in 2021. Two film productions received national awards: The short film Death of a Boy received two awards in the film festival Love & Anarchy's competition for domestic short films, and an Arcada film team was given a Finnish Film Foundation PITCH2021 award for pitching the short film DE VA DE. In addition, international success was earned with a finished production, the drama series Fejd, was picked for the Nordic Talents Pitch Competition. When the national broadcaster Yle, for the second year in a row, shows an interest in acquiring productions by Arcada’s students for their streaming service Arena, it says something about the level of the culture and media education at Arcada.

During the year, Arcada’s degree programmes have acquired distinction in other ways, too. In March 2021 it became evident that Arcada’s nursing programme is of a very high standard, the best in the country, according to national quality indicators. Arcada’s simulation centre, Arcada Patient Safety and Learning Center (APSLC), used in every care-oriented degree programme, also received an award in October for exemplary work in improving patient safety through simulation learning and activities from the Finnish Society for Patient and Client Safety (SPTY). A new set of courses in circular economy, aimed specifically at engineers, was launched during the summer. This is part of our sustainability work and also provides an opportunity for working engineers to update their skills in environmentally friendly production methods, product life-cycles, minimising waste and in sustainable work processes.

Cooperation and sustainability

Arcada, together with neighbouring Prakticum, took on a regional social responsibility by initiating and launching a new career centre, with new supporting services for a broad target group. In April 2021, Karriärcenter Arabia was launched, offering career guidance for everyone interested in studies or further education in Swedish in Finland, on campus or online. Beginning in summer, another Arcada counselling service, Supporting Immigrants in Higher Education (SIMHE) was launched to provide counselling for those who wish to integrate with Swedish as the first language. In the beginning of autumn this was strengthened by a new cooperative agreement between Arcada, Prakticum, Arbis in Helsinki and Borgå folkakademi.

In the sustainability area, Arcada chose the UN sustainability target as a way to highlight the measures we have taken and the choices we have made. From 2021 Arcada throws light on the way all new research projects and degree courses relate to the global aims. On campus everyone, both students and staff, are reminded of the common responsibility to build a sustainable future. This is in part supported by the activity-based way of working our staff has adopted, beginning last autumn. Our new activity-based way of using the campus promotes staff health while reducing the ecological footprint of Arcada by reducing emissions from commuting.

During the year, we identified the need to streamline our organisation and to improve the conditions for increasing external financing and for more efficient use of the financing we have received. While we have been very successful, the economic forecasts show that in the coming years Arcada will experience a definite downturn in government grants. In October, the Arcada board therefore decided to prepare for downsizing negotiations. Government grants are reduced because Arcada, notwithstanding quite stable results in absolute terms, has experienced a reduction in the share of national total results. The saving requirement amounts to about one million euros annually. Negotiations were completed on 1.11.2021 and resulted in staff reductions concerning eight people in total and a new organisational structure. The new, streamlined organisation has been operational since 1.1.2022.

Stakeholders are provided with a designed environment where researchers, students, representatives of industry and consumers are brought together.

In conclusion, I would like to mention Arcada’s 25th anniversary. Much has been achieved in order to launch a new anniversary campaign in 2022. We aim to raise capital to build ultra-modern teaching and research facilities. In 2021, Arcada continued to look firmly ahead. The campaign is designed to provide students with the best possible prospects of acquiring professional skills for a future career. Stakeholders are provided with a designed environment where researchers, students, representatives of industry and consumers are brought together under the auspices of projects that develop and test sustainable and innovative solutions that individuals, society and organisations really need.

The campaign slogan “The future rarely turns out the way we plan. Often, it turns out ever better.” corresponds rather well with Arcada’s aims. We continue to make education a road toward a rewarding and sustainable life.

Helsinki, April 4th 2022

Mona Forsskåhl