Laura Kestilä, PhD

Senior Researcher

The Finnish Youth Research Network (NTV) and

National Institute for Health and Welfare (THL)

Juha Makkonen, MA

Senior Lecturer

HUMAK University of Applied Sciences

NGO and Youth Work

FINLAND: OVERVIEW OF USING INDICATORS IN POLICY

LEGAL BASIS

• Youth Act (72/2006)Some headlines

– according to the Youth Act a young person is anyone under the age of 29 years

– the Government shall adopt a youth policy development programme every four years

– the youth act is an act on the financing of youth work – this includes also financial support for youth research

• Children, Youth and Families – Government Policy ProgrammeSome headlines

– developing knowledgebase on well-being

– designing evaluation of the impacts of policy on children

• Child and Youth Policy Development Programme 2007-2011

– a development programme prepared in accordance with the Youth Act

– includes national youth policy objectives and also outlines those for regional and local authorities related to, for example, education, employment, health, active citizenship, social empowerment, housing and entrepreneurship

– the implementation of the development programme is evaluated annually by the Advisory Council for Youth Affairs

– according to the Youth Act a young person is anyone under the age of 29 years - in practice this implies that the youth policy programme includes also small children

AGE-STRUCTURE OF THE FINNISH POPULATION

600

800

1000

1200

1400

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2000 2010 2020 2030 2040 2050

0 - 14 65 +

Source: Statistics FinlandPopulation projection 2007

Children (0 - 14) and adults (65 +) .............................................................................1 000 persons

THE PROPORTION OF FULL AND PART-TIME STUDENTS AGED 27 YEARS

1. As a percentage of the population in the same age group.Source: OECD (2008), Education database.

THE BASIC CHALLENGES

• People enter work life too late and leave work life too early

• The average duration of retirement period has increased due to the increasing life expectancy

• Decreasing the proportion of drop-outs would be important

– It has been estimated that the expenses of one socially excluded young person is about one million euros in Finland

• Ministry of Education has two separate working groups which have prepared set of indicators – one for children (up to 17 years of age) and one for young adults (18-29 years of age) indicators

• Both groups have utilized already existent databases and proposed new indicators and statistics

• The lists of the indicators consist of 40-60 indicators. They are divided into several categories:

– health– education– involvement (active citizenship)– employment – living environment– support of society

• Finland has several register-based statistics and repetitive nationwide surveys, which provide new information on the health and well-being of children and young people, as well as the trends of them in time

• In addition, several projects are now developing follow-up data systems for national and regional use. There is need for..

– gathering relevant information to the same systems– regional information (municipalities)– information on well-being and health according to SEP, gender, ethnic background etc.– new indicators

which type of new information is needed? qualitative indicators?

• There is only little information on children under the school age– development of new monitoring systems (data from the service system, for example child

welfare clinics and school)

REGISTER-BASED DATA AND REPETITIVE SURVEYS AS SOURCES FOR INDICATORS

• To mention some key datasets where information on youth well-being is available/**will be available soon

– Statistics Finland registers– Child Welfare –statistics– School Health Promotion Study (SHP) – Adolescent Health and Lifestyle Survey (AHLS) – Youth Barometer – Youth Living Conditions -survey – The Health Behaviour Monitoring among the Finnish Adult Population (AVTK) – **Regional Health and Well-Being Study (ATH)– **LATE (health monitoring of children) and OPTE (health monitoring of students)

EXPERIENCES FROM INDICATOR WORK IN FINLAND: DILEMMA OF CHOICE 1/2

• Definition of ”well-being”?– Dimensions operationalisation

• Purpose of use?– International level, national level, local level– Description, differences between population groups– Decision-makers in municipalities, experts in health promotion, national level– Regional information – on which level?

• Scientific relevance• Policy relevance: indicators describing phenomena that can be influenced

• Age(group)-specific indicators– Some phenomena relevant only to certain age-groups– Adjustment for age?

• Choice of the background variables– Health and well-being differences between population groups

• gender, education, ethnic background, region

• positive or negative emphasis?

– problem-based indicators

• Frequency of collecting data?– goal: reliable information– depends on the indicator

• Core-indicators, alarm-indicators, key-indicators– hierarchy: order of importance, sub-categories

• Publishing…– to whom and how?

• Internet, paper copies, user interface• International comparisons

DILEMMA OF CHOICE 2/2

QUALITY OF INDICATORS

A. Single indicators – relevance – validity – reliability – availability – usability

B. Set of indicators– scope, extensive content– usability– continuity

Source: Quality criteria for indicators, INDI-program, THL

THANK YOU FOR YOUR ATTENTION!

laura.kestila@thl.fi

juha.makkonen@humak.fi