AKOL - Monitoring members’ interests and supporting their welfare, expertise and internationalisation
AKOL means Trade Union of Adult Educators in Finland. We represent trainers, teachers and lecturers who are working in vocational adult education centres and other adult education institutions in Finland. AKOL has 2000 members.

There are 42 vocational adult education centres covering the whole country. The government of Finland has authorised those institutes to function as a Vocational Adult Education Centre. The activities of each Vocational Adult Education Centre are regulated by the respective act on Vocational Adult Education of Finland. Accordingly, our members represent all kinds of fields in adult education ranging from vocational training for vocational qualifications, occupational training, training for vocational and other diplomas accredited the national educational authorities etc., in Finland. In addition, our members are experts in personnel training, on-the-job training, apprenticeship training, distance learning, life long learning principles and practices as well as e-learning in various fields. In fact, the expertise of our members covers the whole field of adult education training in Finland not forgetting our members' work and input when developing new curricula and training of immigrants and refugees. We are also a member organisation of OAJ - Trade Union of Education in Finland and we work with its other member organisations. The OAJ membership is nearly 109 000 ( for further information on OAJ, please visit http://www.oaj.fi/ ).

AKOL has been an active partner and / or co-ordinator in several transnational projects such as LEONARDO -, ADAPT -, INTEGRA-, Socrates -projects etc. Through our members we also have a large number of partners and counterparts in the Baltic countries as well as in Russia . If you wish to have further information on the projects we are running at the moment please read more. Finally, we are pleased to assist you if you are looking an individual Vocational Adult Education Centre to become your project partner.

If you are looking a partner for transnational or other projects, please do not hesitate to contact us. Please note also that we can offer you an excellent dissemination channel for the outcomes of your project in Finland!