The first higher education institutions have begun deploying the Opin.fi service

Although the development of Opin.fi is still underway and there is plenty to do, we are already preparing to deploy the service. Higher education institutions will adopt the service gradually in three groups in 2024 and 2025. The service will be made available to all learners in spring 2025.

The development of the Opin.fi service is advancing rapidly, and the first higher education institutions will be able to adopt the service this year. The deployment will take place in three groups in stages. Higher education institutions have been assigned into A, B and C groups according to their own schedules.

Group A has already begun adopting the service this spring. Aalto University, Haaga-Helia University of Applied Sciences, Häme University of Applied Sciences and the University of Jyväskylä, Lapland University of Applied Sciences, University of Lapland, Laurea University of Applied Sciences and Seinäjoki University of Applied Sciences are the first to join the service.

The service develops as deployment progress

In practice, gradual deployment means that higher education institutions will join the Opin.fi service at different times. As the service is constantly developed at the same time, different versions of the service will be deployed at different times.

The first higher education institutions will start with the “beta version” in autumn 2024. According to the preliminary plan, the B group will prepare for the deployment of version 3.0 at the end of 2024, and the C group will start adopting the service in 2025, when the launch version of Opin.fi will be finished. The schedule is still tentative, and changes are possible.

Different versions are different in scope. For example, the beta version does not yet have all the functionalities that the launch version will contain. All higher education institutions will have the same version of the service at the time of the launch.

The first deployment group is approaching the beta stage

Group A plays an important role, as both the Digivisio project office and higher education institutions are adopting something new. When the other groups deploy the service, we will already be wiser in many respects, as the problems will have been solved with the A group’s higher education institutions first.

“The deployment model will develop as we learn along the way. At the same time, we will form an idea on how to approach the launch in a controlled manner,” says team leader Erika Maliranta.

The work was started during the spring with nearly weekly meetings between the A group’s higher education institutions and the project office. These meetings have addressed questions related to the deployment and practical matters. Each institution has its own deployment project manager, and experts from other areas are also involved. The deployment requires close co-operation between different areas of responsibility. Some matters to consider are the management of educational offering, integrations with the service, communications and the necessary training.

“Thanks to the A group’s work, both the project office and higher education institutions now have a much-needed concrete idea and view of what work stages the deployment of the Opin.fi service will require. The best aspects of our work together are peer support and sharing good practices, and the accumulated wisdom will also be shared with the higher education institutions that are still waiting for their turn,” says project manager Eeva Tuori-Pastila.

We will need to prepare the service this spring, but after the summer holidays, the A group’s higher education institutions will be able to examine their educational offering in the actual service for the first time. Learners can be included in the service when there is an adequate supply available. Opin.fi is not yet openly available to everyone online; access to the service is restricted.

This will mark the beginning of the beta stage of the Opin.fi service, and we will be able to learn from both higher education institutions’ and learners’ user experiences.

Read more about the beta: