The Social Insurance Institution-Kela decided to discontinue student financial aid for about 4700 students due to insufficient progress in their studies, said Kela in a press release on Monday.
Kela in autumn monitored the study progress of about 283,000 students, who received financial aid in the academic year 2024-2025 and took the decision based on the monitoring results.
Most of them, who are going to lose the financial aid, are higher education students.
Kela monitors students’ study progress annually. Through the monitoring, Kela checks whether the eligibility criteria for financial aid are met, whether students have earned enough credits during the academic year.
About 15,200 higher education students and about 6,000 students in secondary education failed to make sufficient progress in their studies in the previous academic year and thus received a request for further information from Kela in September or October.
Considering the further information, Kela decided to discontinue the financial aid for approximately 4,700 students. Of these students, about 3,700 are in higher education and about 1,000 are in secondary education.
The financial aid is discontinued for 1.7% of the students whose study progress was monitored this autumn.
“We only have to discontinue the financial aid for a small percentage of the students. Most students make great progress in their studies. Indeed, discontinuing the financial aid is our last means of reminding students that they must make progress in their studies,” said Linda Reinikainen, Legal Counsel of Kela’s Student Financial Aid Group.
According to Reinikainen, students who have received a request for further information can in such situations also provide the information afterwards. Kela will then determine whether the decision can be changed based on this.
The payments of most of the affected students will be stooped from January 2026.
Meanwhile, the students will also lose the housing supplement at the same time.
If the financial aid is discontinued due to insufficient study progress, the housing supplement for students will also be discontinued, said Kela.
“The student can again apply for financial aid when they have made sufficient progress in their studies,” said Reinikainen.
- 4700 students
- Lose
- Kela
- Benifit
Source: www.dailyfinland.fi
