New Universities and their cities, the case of Vaasa, Finland

University activities began in Finland in 1640 when the University of Turku was founded. Later it was transferred to Helsinki, the new capital of Finland. The turn of the century saw the emergence of new university level institutions in Helsinki and Turku. The explosion of the Finnish university system took place after the Second World War. Now there are 20 university level institutes. Consequently the access to university studies and other services has improved greatly. The university centre of Vaasa belongs to the new wave of universities founded from 1960 on. In the city there are now 4 units, one Finnish speaking, two Swedish speaking and one bilingual. This reflects the language structure of the area. All of the universities have had their individual development features. The Finnish speaking University of Vaasa is the biggest one. The main impact of the Vaasa universities is the participation in the rising of the level of education in Finland and its effect on economy and other development. The research institute of Vaasa University has served the surrounding areas and nation through applied research projects. The continuing education centre has served the areas firms with many kinds of tailored courses for the management. In the humanistics influence has been through specialised language courses and multilingual immersion. A newspaper university is one of the new forms of impact. The city has an Academic axis going through the innermost part of the city. It is divided clearly into two Finnish and one Swedish speaking area.