The school social worker is a social care professional who helps pupils and students understand and work through their situation as individuals, within their families, and as members of groups and the school community. You can turn to the social worker if you have concerns about behaviour, managing emotions, breaking rules, frequent absences, relationships, loneliness, bullying, family circumstances, life changes or leisure time. The social worker also provides guidance on accessing other services.

The social worker meets pupils and students at school during school hours, unless they prefer another time. Support usually consists of one to five meetings. The social worker also talks with guardians, works with school staff and other professionals, and participates in multidisciplinary expert groups supporting individual pupils and students.

School social workers began using Saga, the social welfare client information system, in August 2025. Receiving support from the social worker establishes a social welfare client relationship. Client information is stored in Kanta and can also be viewed by guardians acting on their child’s behalf in MyKanta. Records of individual appointments will become visible retrospectively during autumn 2026. Where there are compelling grounds, the social worker can restrict the visibility of this information.

In addition to individual support, the social worker contributes to school-wide well-being activities at group and class level. The social worker delivers classroom sessions and runs groups based on identified needs together with other professionals.

Pupils, students, guardians, school staff and other professionals can contact the social worker by phone, Wilma or email on weekdays. Please feel free to get in touch — we can work things out together.

Jukka Vesterinen
Email: jukka.vesterinen@pshyvinvointialue.fi
Phone: 040 568 1448
You can also contact the school social worker via Wilma.