The Finnish Union of University Researchers and Teachers (FUURT) held its union meeting on November 9, 2024, to decide on the activities and finances for the upcoming year. The meeting elected Antti Pajala as President and Tommi Kokkonen and Paula Silvén as Vice Presidents for the 2025–2026 term.
Doc. Pol. Sci. Antti Pajala serves as the Head of Division and University Lecturer in Political Science at the University of Turku. He has been the chief shop steward at the University of Turku since 2020 and has actively participated in the activities of the Turku researchers’ association TuT for approximately 17 years.
– Through my extensive experience as chief shop steward, I see the university as a place of generations and cultures. There is great potential within us researchers, and it is crucial to ensure that it is fully utilised. As President, it is important to me that this community moves forward through positive dialogue, says Pajala.
The union meeting elected PhD Tommi Kokkonen and M.A. Paula Silvén as Vice Presidents of FUURT.
Kokkonen works as a university teacher at the University of Turku and as a part-time teacher at the University of Helsinki. He has been a member of the Union Board during 2019–2020 and a vice member during 2021–2022. He has also been a part of the early career researchers committee and held the position of shop steward and deputy shop steward at the University of Helsinki.
Silvén is a researcher for the Kone Foundation project Democracy in Finnish Universities: University Autonomy and the Crisis of Representative Democracy (UNIDEMO) and for the Academy of Finland project Transnational Knowledge Networks in Higher Education Policymaking (KNETS), and she works on her doctoral thesis at Tampere University. She has been a member of the Union Board during 2024.
The union meeting also decided on the members and vice-members of next year’s Board, as proposed by the Electoral Committee.
The union meeting raises concerns about the state of university democracy in a statement
In addition to the elections to the Union’s positions of trust, the union meeting approved next year’s action plan and budget and decided on the 2025 membership fees. The union meeting also approved several changes to the Union Rules. In future, the term of the Union Board will be two calendar years instead of one.
The meeting also adopted a statement expressing the concerns of the research community about the state of university democracy.
”The Finnish Union of University Researchers and Teachers (FUURT) demands that documents that significantly guide the activities of universities, such as the budget, university regulations, and the principles for using university facilities, should be approved by the university community’s own collegial decision-making bodies,” the statement says. Read the statement here.
More information:
President Tero Karjalainen
Executive Director Nina Hahtela, 0207 589 616
Possible requests for interviews: Head of Communication Siiri Hiidenvuori, +358 40 5619903
All email addresses are given as firstname.lastname(a)tieteentekijat.fi
Members of the FUURT Board 2025-2026 (personal vice-member in brackets)
Saara Koikkalainen ITTE (Sanna Rantakömi ITTE)
Stefan Baumeister JYTTE (Minni Matikainen JYTTE)
Maija Paavolainen INA (Jussi Hyvärinen INA)
Johanna Wartio ATTE (Tommi Mäklin HYT)
Freddy Suarez Rodriguez (FfÅA Elina Pelto TuT)
Marko Helenius 3T (Vadim Romashov TATTE)
Pauli Väisänen OUTI (Iira Rautiainen OUTI)
Jussi Simola SATY (Meri Jalonen SATY)