KATEKO — Bilingual Education in Health Sciences and Engineering

Bilingual Education in Health Sciences and Engineering project, KATEKO, develops functionally bilingual Bachelor’s degree programmes at the University of Eastern Finland to strengthen the international attractiveness of the fields of health sciences and engineering and to support students in developing their skills in both Finnish and English. The aim of the project is to create a pedagogical model that enables the provision of high‑quality education in English while ensuring that international students have a realistic pathway to integrate into Finnish society and working life by learning Finnish. The project supports the university’s strategic goals, the region’s competence needs, and the Ministry of Education and Culture’s policies on the internationalisation of education.

The project focuses particularly on two new Bachelor’s Degree Programmes, Human and Planetary Health (Bachelor of Health Sciences) and Biomedical Engineering (Bachelor of Science, Technology), for which it develops structures and practices that support functionally bilingual education. The project creates solutions that promote joint learning among students from different linguistic backgrounds and strengthen students’ linguistic skills. Its aim is to ensure that students can develop not only their academic expertise but also the multilingual communication skills required in working life. Additionally, the project supports teaching and guidance staff in implementing multilingual pedagogy and examines the opportunities offered by digital and AI‑based solutions for designing and developing multilingual pedagogical models. The aim is to create models that can also be applied in other degree programmes and institutions.

The activities of the KATEKO project also have broader regional significance, as the project aims to increase the region’s attractiveness from the perspective of international talent and to support students’ employment opportunities after graduation, thereby strengthening the long‑term vitality of Eastern Finland. The project is carried out in collaboration with the Faculty of Health Sciences, the Faculty of Science, Forestry and Technology, and the Language Centre.