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The Art Testers cultural education programme will once again provide high-quality art experiences to all Year 8 pupils in Finland during the 2025–26 academic year. A record-breaking 183 applications were submitted to the programme’s open call, offering nearly 200 unique experiences from across the country. A total of 91 art providers were selected to participate.

The Art Testers cultural education programme is once again seeking professionally produced, impressive, surprising, unusual, wonderful, fun, and thought-provoking art experiences for young people. Applications for arts practitioners to participate in the Art Testers programme for the 2025–2026 academic year will be open from 7th to 21st November 2024 in the electronic application service of the Finnish Cultural Foundation.

The eighth year of the Art Testers program has begun. During the 2024–2025 school year, all eighth graders in Finland will once again have the opportunity to participate in two high-quality art visits. A total of 88 art organizations from various fields and regions of Finland will be involved in creating these art experiences.

Due to the organizational changes and other personnel shifts at the Finnish Association of Children's Cultural Centers, four new employees joined the Art Testers program in August. Erja Saaranen, Marianna Penttilä, Karolina Ajanki and Laura Holm are the new faces of the Taidetestaajat team.

In this article we share the results of an analysis of 150 000 reviews given by the young art testers during the first five academic years of the program.

The sixth semester of the Art Testers program started this year in the gorgeous national landscapes of Koli, North Karelia, when a big bunch of Karelian eighth graders traveled to experience and review a multidisciplinary Sibelius-themed show with music, stories, a short film and an exhibition. The reviews were magnificent.

This year, the program continues with a new operating model. For the first time in the history of the Art Testers program, the schools have had the chance to choose whether they want two regional art visits or one regional and one national visit - primarily to a national art institution in the capital area.

The funders of the Art Testers program commit an average expenditure of 40–100 EUR per student on an art visit. In total, the expenditure on the Art Testers program is 3–7 MEUR per school year. But what exactly do students and teachers get from art testing? And how is the program connected to the national curriculum?

August 2, 2021, Heidi Rantanen (M.A.) started her work as Communications Planner for the Art Testers. In the future, Heidi will be in charge of the communications for Art Testers, supporting Manager Mr Joonas Keskinen and the Art Testers’ national coordination team.