HEI Schools has built Finnish early education and the educational system into an international export. The aim is to create top-quality early education to reach as many children and families as possible.
Now the initiative is starting a collaboration with the City of Helsinki and the University of Helsinki in a kindergarten in Jätkäsaari, a neighborhood in Helsinki. The collaboration aims to further develop the Finnish early childhood education model through research and training. In addition, this project aims to create an international showroom of quality Finnish early childhood education and how it works in practice. The kindergarten is operated by the City of Helsinki.
HEI Schools will be responsible for producing the kindergarten's international pedagogical content and training the educators to use HEI Schools´ content and tools. The kindergarten will have access to a vast amount of early childhood education content, tools to facilitate planning work, and the opportunity for international contacts and natural collaboration between children and educators around the world in HEI Schools kindergartens.
The cooperation will focus on research, training, and development projects in early childhood education and will begin in August 2021. The new kindergarten building was completed in the summer of 2020 following the HEI Schools space design concept guidelines by architect company Collaboratorio.
There are currently 14 HEI Schools Learning Centers open in China, Indonesia, Korea, Argentina, Australia, Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Finland, with 16 more set to open in 2021. Research-based pedagogy and teacher training are at the heart of the HEI Schools model.