Education
What could be a more fun place to study than Oulu? The youthful city offers education in several different levels – naturally with a decent dose of extracurricular activities and all the excitement of student life.
Oulu is known as the fastest growing urban region in Arctic Europe – and an excellent city for education. In Oulu, you can find friends throughout your educational journey: The region has 250 000 inhabitants with 120 nationalities represented. Currently, Oulu is home to 25 000 university students – join the party!
How to find suitable education and how to apply for it?
See tips at opintopolku.fi (opens in a new tab)
Looking to gain employment, acquire a mentor or make new professional connections in Oulu?
Read more about Career Center
Are you looking for a sneak peek into Finnish? Or have you already studied some Finnish and wish to continue learning? Oulu has hundreds of Finnish courses on offer for all levels of students.
Education and research
The youthful city of Oulu offers education on several different levels – naturally with a decent dose of extracurricular activities and all the excitement of student life. Currently, Oulu is home to 25 000 university students, Oulu is known as the fastest growing urban region in Arctic Europe – and an excellent city for education.
In Oulu, you can find friends throughout your educational journey: The region has 250 000 inhabitants with 120 nationalities represented.
We are also quite a youthful city by European standards, for our average age is only 38 years. As many as one third of our residents have a university degree, so we can modestly say that we are quite a smart bunch.
Do not hesitate to join us and find your own path in Oulu!
On top of education: the universities in Oulu
Oulu University of Applied Sciences and the University of Oulu are among the biggest universities in Finland. We also have a third university, the Diaconia University of Applied Sciences. Together the institutions offer more than 60 fields of study, with dozens of international degree programmes. See the opportunities in Oulu at the City of Oulu web pages (opens in a new tab).
Established in 1958, the University of Oulu is one of the biggest Finnish universities and among the northernmost universities in the world. It has eight faculties, 13 500 students and nearly 3500 employees on two campuses, Linnanmaa and Kontinkangas. The University of Oulu offers 21 Master’s programmes (2 years) and three Bachelor’s and Master’s programmes (3 + 2 years) taught in English.
Read more about the University of Oulu (opens in a new tab)
Oulu University of Applied Sciences has about 9 000 students and 460 employees. The scale of education covers six main fields of study.
Find out more about Oulu University of Applied Sciences (opens in a new tab)
At Diak Oulu campus, you can take degrees in the fields of social work, health care, and diaconal work as full-time or blended studies.
See the selection at Diak Diaconia University of Applied Sciences (opens in a new tab)
Expertise for the future: vocational basic education
Vocational basic education is arranged in vocational schools and as apprenticeship training. Find the opportunities in Oulu as collected on the City of Oulu web page (opens in a new tab).
OSAO Educational Consortium (opens in a new tab)
PSK Adult Education Centre (opens in a new tab)
Oulu Conservatory (opens in a new tab)
Luovi Vocational College (opens in a new tab)
Diakonia College of Finland (opens in a new tab)
Oulu College of Services (opens in a new tab)
Research and development
The investments in research and development per capita in Oulu are the biggest in Finland. Positive growth in the amount of product development investments means that new companies and jobs are being created and a significant proportion of Finnish product development is done in Oulu. Oulu sets the course for the future particularly in the fields of ICT, health, and environmental technology.
Learn more about research in Oulu
Research units at the University of Oulu (opens in a new tab)
Learn more about research at Oulu University of Applied Sciences
Research, development and innovation at Oulu University of Applied Sciences (opens in a new tab)
Learn more about intelligent solutions made in Oulu at Smart City Oulu website
Smart City Oulu (opens in a new tab)
Are you a group of teachers, principals or other education professionals?
Are you interested in in-service training in Oulu or online? Do you want to combine school visits, discussions and lectures to learn about Finnish school system and about teaching sustainability, digitalization, entrepreneurship, STEAM or other themes?
Educational and Cultural Services (City of Oulu) is a provider of high-quality education in Finland. Early education and care, primary, secondary and upper secondary education and education for adults are organized in our services. Whether you have a group of professionals or a group of children or youth, we have something for you.
