The Story of Suomipassi

Here you can read the story of Suomipassi since 2017.

Pictures from Suomipassi pilot 2017

Suomipassi was originally Finnish as a Foreign language teacher Jenni Laaksonen’s idea of a paper booklet that compiled basic phrases in Finnish and English, which beginner-level Finnish learners need in everyday situations.

The name Suomipassi comes from the idea that students were tasked with collecting stamps in their passports by speaking Finnish. The pilot was carried out in collaboration between Jenni Laaksonen at CeLCS at the University of Turku and Satu Nurmi and Frida Pessi from the Student Union of the University of Turku (TYY). Jenni Laaksonen created the content for the passport, while TYY contacted companies, marketed the pilot, and produced and funded the printed passport. The phrases and service locations were selected with the specific needs of exchange and degree students studying at the university in mind. At the end of the course, students returned their passports and received either points toward the final exam or a replacement for the oral exam, provided they had collected enough entries.

The first paper version of Suomipassi was piloted in Finnish language courses at CeLCS. Students were required to collect 10 entries for speaking Finnish during the course. The teacher supported the students and observed the service interactions. It was wonderful to witness the students’ excitement, nervousness, and the moment when communication succeeded and the message got through. What better feeling could there be when using a language! It was especially important to encourage partner organizations to use easy-to-understand Finnish (selkosuomi) in service situations so that students would have a positive experience speaking Finnish.

Students who participated in the pilot visited more than 30 businesses in Turku. This was a great result, considering that there were only 11 “official” partner organizations. Enthusiastic students had explained the passport idea to other businesses and received entries from them as well. Excellent initiative! Many felt that speaking Finnish was very challenging and nerve-wracking at first, but gradually it became easier. The most important outcome was that Suomipassi encouraged, motivated, and inspired students to use Finnish more. The pilot also revealed that the passport is most beneficial when used as part of a course and when students are committed to using it.

In spring 2018, the next phase of Suomipassi began as part of the Study in Turku collaboration. The idea to turn Suomipassi into a mobile app came from a student: an app would be much easier to carry around! Suomipassi and the Study in Turku were a perfect match—both aimed to give international students the tools for a smooth everyday life and help them feel that Turku is a great place to live and study.

When a newly arrived student in Finland has a concrete tool like this to support their Finnish language learning, the threshold to start using the language becomes lower. The app is a digital aid and motivator, but it’s important to remember that it doesn’t replace systematic and long-term language skill development.

At the beginning of the project, the content—phrases—was created and later refined based on student feedback. The mobile app included significantly more phrases than the printed version, along with vocabulary and numbers. Initially, the app was intended to be available in Finnish, Swedish, and English, but enthusiastic Finnish learners wanted to contribute and translated the phrases into Chinese, Russian, German, and Spanish. It was wonderful to see how excited students were to join the project!

To support pronunciation practice, the phrases were also recorded. In the mobile app, users don’t need a stamp from staff at service locations—instead, they mark it themselves: once they’ve spoken Finnish, they can mark the phrase as completed. Later, the student can see on the app’s map where they’ve spoken Finnish.

The mobile app was released in autumn 2018 and updated in spring 2019 with new phrases and languages: Italian, Arabic, French, and spoken Finnish were added. A phrase search function and clear info images explaining how to use the app were also introduced.

Suomipassi was downloaded thousands of times and received a lot of positive feedback. Over the years, the app’s technology became outdated and could no longer be fixed. In 2023, the CeLCS launched a two-year project called Guiding Towards Fluent Finnish (OSUS), with one of its goals being the update of Suomipassi.

During 2024, Suomipassi was practically rebuilt from scratch using the Flutter tool. The design is now fresher, the categorization more user-friendly, and previous features have been improved. The content has been updated, and the app now includes over 350 phrases, including vocabulary related to recycling.

A major update is that the default language of Suomipassi is now spoken Finnish, and the phrases have been recorded in spoken language. This means learners hear real-life spoken Finnish instead of formal written language. Users can mark their favorite phrases, and reward themselves with an emoji for speaking. As before, users can stamp a phrase once spoken and see the speaking location on the map.

You can read more about how to use the app and its features on the How to Use Suomipassi page.

Pictures from Suomipassi course spring 2025

In spring 2025, the first Suomipassi course was organized. You can read more about the course concept here.

In autumn 2025, Suomipassi was improved during the final phase of the project. The following changes were made to the app:

  • The app now opens in seconds. Previously, it took several minutes because the system reloaded all content every time.
  • Users can suggest a phrase if something is missing.
  • Info images are larger and easier to read.
  • Stamps appear as Suomipassi logos on the map.
  • Stamps and emojis can be deleted.
  • The learning diary is in chronological order, with the newest emoji/stamp first.