The popularity of home school has grown in recent years. According to Statistics Finland, 502 Finnish children and young people attended home school last year.
Over the past decade, home schooling has grown gradually, with a steeper increase in 2020. In 2019 there were 437 home schooled children in Finland, while in 2020 there were 501. This rise in popularity was largely attributed to the pandemic.
The number of home schooled children dipped down to 445 in 2021, but the most recent statistics from 2022 show a rise back to pandemic levels.
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The Finnish National Agency for Education received a large number of enquiries about home-schooling, and these enquiries suggest that there may be a variety of reasons for choosing homeschooling, such as religious or ideological beliefs.
For example, a parent may have the idea that the school curriculum or teaching does not match the family's values.
Parents also have more options of working remotely, which may mean attending school permanently or, for example, abroad during the winter months.
The choice to homeschool may also be motivated by issues such as bullying.
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