Our Students Are Gems!

A couple of weeks ago Rosa Pons and Cristina Perales from University of Vic, Barcelona, did their five day staff exchange at TAMK School of Art and Media. They did a workshop with our film and television students, who loved it. The visit once again showed that carefully prepared and implemented visits of lecturers really make sense and pay off.

More joy was to follow: Rosa and Cristina send their feedback, and it was so uplifting I simply have to publish it in our blog:

• We found your students very well prepared for team and autonomous working and they have a huge capacity for work.
• They are quick in learning and seem they aim to improve their skills.
• They are respectful with the others and have a positive attitude. They accept having a leader to guide the production.
• They know how to comprehend the subtext of a scene.
• They can play a role and do it properly, they have intuition and talent.
• They can handle a problem, improvise and organize an audiovisual production in a short time.
• They listen and value the teacher’s suggestions.
• They have a strong cultural background which gives them the ability of having criteria and opinion.
• They know the economical worth of an audiovisual production.

It is very important that friends now and then remind us, how privileged we are working with such brilliant students :-)

Read the story about the visit
University of Vic

Pictured: Rosa Pons and Cristina Perales at the roof garden of the Finlayson Campus

Finnish-Russian co-operation in forestry education leads to European-style curriculum and new kind of know-how in Russian forestry colleges

The participants were very interested to see a harvester at work.

TAMK’s forestry degree programme has been working in a three year –long project with Russian forestry colleges since 2006. The objective was to renew the curriculums of the forestry colleges and give the teachers of the colleges a chance to see how forestry works in Finland. The most important target has been achieved, because in September 2009, The Russian Ministry of Education and science accepted the draft curriculum standard. This means that from the beginning of 2010 all forestry colleges will in practice apply the same curriculum everywhere in Russia.

The project has been financed by Finnish Ministry of Foreign Affairs and it is part of the Finnish-Russian Development Programme on Sustainable Forest Management and Conservation of Biological Diversity in North-West Russia. The budget of TAMK has been the total of 140 000 euros.

In practice the project’s realization has meant seminars both in Pushkino, Russia and Tampere, Finland. The project group also visited Luua college in Estonia in order to see how successful changes in forestry education can be done. The core partners in this project have been the vice-rectors of forestry colleges in North-West Russia and Aura Loikkanen and Ari Vanamo from TAMK.

The Electrician Won Three Prizes in St.Petersburg

VIII Open St.Petersburg Student Film Festival "BEGINNING" took place this week in St.Petersburg, Russia. The global contest of the festival invited again this year two films from TAMK to be shown in the category for Fiction films.

This time it was success for the Electrician. Sound designer Jarno Muhonen was awarded as the Best Sound Supervisor and scriptwriter Jussi Jokihaara with the Best Script of Fiction Film. Director Miina Alajärvi was granted a diploma for the image of the cinematographic language.

Jussi Jokihaara's script was a result of his work when he was a student of the MA in Screenwriting programme, jointly arranged by TAMK and University of Salford.

The Electrician is the story of Marvin - an executioner in charge of the electric chair, who has to find a new way to use his unusual skill when he becomes unemployed. The film is a co-production with Salford University, UK.

Earlier this month the Electrician became second in the Audience Award Competition of the Reikäreuna Film Festival.

The Electrician will keep busy this autumn, it has been invited to:
Upcoming International Film Festival Hannover
Shnit International Short Film Festival in Berne and Cologne

Beginning festival&winners

The Electrician home (also trailer)
All posts about the Electrician (TAMK School of Art and Media blog)
The Electrician@Facebook

Forest invites exchange students

At the third meeting of the 'Finnish Way of Life Club' it was time to see some Finnish nature by walking in the Niihama forest. At first the group of students took a bus to Niihama area and then walked to the camping area to grill some sausages and marshmallows.



I was so happily surprised of the large amount of exchange students who came, as there were altogether 25 exchange students of PIRAMK, who wanted to walk in the forest and taste some Finnish sausages. They even wanted to walk back from the forest to PIRAMK and didn't want to take bus, even though it was already getting dark. This evening was really successfull in every way!

To be continued next week...

Text and photo by Miia Lehtinen

Markku Lahtinen to Lead New TAMK

Markku Lahtinen (50) is elected president of the new TAMK University of Applied Sciences as TAMK and PIRAMK UAS merge on 1 January 2010. He has been the president of TAMK University of Applied Sciences since 1997.

President Markku Lahtinen will lead the third largest Finnish university of applied sciences with approximately 9000 students. The new TAMK will have campuses in Tampere, Ikaalinen, Mänttä-Vilppula and Virrat. The number of staff will be approximately 850.

Education and related research and development of the multidisciplinary TAMK will focus on technology, wellbeing services, business administration, tourism and culture. The new TAMK provides degree-awarding education in more than 40 degree programmes in seven fields of study: Culture, Natural sciences, Natural resources and the environment, Tourism, catering and domestic services, Social services, health and sports, Technology, communication and transport, Social sciences, business and administration. In addition, TAMK provides vocational teacher education and diverse further and continuing education possibilities.

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