The making of the standard pupil through national final assessment criteria?

Our study addresses the growing emphasis on student assessment and standards-based policy reforms, now central to educational policies worldwide. One lesser-explored implication of these reforms is the subjectivity of the student. Using Thomas Popkewitz’s social epistemology, we examine the kinds of pupils mobilised by the Criteria for Final Assessment in Finnish Primary and Lower Secondary Education, focusing on descriptions regarding learning outcomes for grades 5 and 9. Our analysis demonstrates that contrary to the original purpose of the policy instrument under study – standardising and making grading more equal – it serves to standardise the idea of the pupil. The descriptions regarding grade 5 inscribe an abstraction of a kind of pupil who is limitedly skilled and in need of continuous support and guidance. Conversely, the descriptions regarding grade 9 abstract the pupil as a performative and self-evaluative entrepreneur of theirself, resembling the global notion of the 21st-century lifelong learner, tailored to meet the demands of the global economy. The study illustrates that Finnish assessment policy, often seen as diverging from global trends, resonates with the same rationality, even if the instruments and techniques employed are context specific.