In Favour of More Versatile Education – Academic Citizens Grow With Us

In accordance with the strategy decided by the Representative Council of 2007, the tasks of the Student Union are trusteeship work and the serving and supporting of members and organisations. These pages describe the effect of those values and operational principles on HYY's activities, which penetrate all actions of the Student Union. You can find specific definitions of the values in the strategy of HYY (in Finnish).

HYY Values

Responsibility

The Student Union takes responsibility for the present and the future of students and for society at a larger scale. Active trusteeship work with the National Union of University Students in Finland has resulted in raising the student financial aid and the reform of the Universities Act, as well as in removing the effect of spouses’ income from the housing supplement. The Student Union was one of the first student unions to offer permanent employment for its every employee starting from 1 June 2008. HYY has been forced to tighten its management of finances as the Third Student House has caused significant additional costs. The premises which have been in use have been rented out in order to get savings and to secure the finances for future student generations.

Education

The purpose of the Student Union is to have a university system where education is a key value. For HYY, education is expertise, criticality, freedom to think for oneself and courage to express one’s own opinions. Recently, the Student Union has focused on defending free education and the autonomy of universities.

Pluralism

It is important that students genuinely experience that they are part of the university community and the Student Union. HYY aims at taking into consideration the different backgrounds and life situations of its members. Recently, work has been done to improve accessibility on the campuses, in particular. The University and the City of Helsinki have been encouraged to take the physically and visually challenged into consideration. At the same time, HYY is aware that its own Services Office and a large part of its organisational and meeting premises are located in old valuable buildings which are protected by orders and therefore improving accessibility is difficult. The Student Union has increased its information in English by hiring a translator and by providing more material in three languages on its website.

Equality

The Student Union promotes possibilities to study in different life situations regardless of one's social starting points. All members of the student community and the organisations within it must be treated equally and with justice. The Student Union regularly conducts an equality plan which aims at decreasing discrimination within the Student Union which is based on gender, sexual orientation, cultural background or disability, for example. HYY has also actively taken part in campaigns for equality in the working life.

Openness

It is important for the communality of the Student Union that students can and want to have effect on the activities of the Student Union. To reach its members, more effective ways of communications have been emphasised. The Board activities have been more openly informed by launching the Board blog (in Finnish). The Board also informs of the decisions made in the meetings on the open hyy-edari e-mail list.

Other Key Principles Guiding the Activities of the Student Union

Bilingualism

The languages of the Student Union are Finnish and Swedish. Members in both language groups should receive services and documents in their own language. HYY carries out lively bilingualism in its celebrations and the activities of student organisations. HYY also does active trusteeship work to secure services for Swedish-speaking students.

Environmental Responsibility

The Student Union and its companies take environmental impacts into consideration in their actions and actively aim at reducing emissions caused by its operations. HYY takes part in the Polttava kysymys (”burning question”) campaign which promotes reducing emissions. In addition, the HYY Group offers green electricity for its customers.