The Finnish Student Health Service (FSHS) Board of Trustees elected Annika Saarikko, Master of Arts, Member of Parliament, the new Managing Director. She will start in the position on September 8th, 2025, when the FSHS’s long-time Managing Director Katariina Poskiparta leaves the position. Poskiparta will then work as a management advisor during the orientation period of the new Managing Director.
”We are happy to get an influential healthcare professional with wide network as our new Managing Director. The choice was based on open and interactive leadership, courage to carry out improvements and to strengthen the FSHS’s current partnerships and create new ones. Saarikko convinced us with her views on how the FSHS’s role in promotion of the higher education student health and ability to study could be further strengthened”, emphasizes Tuomo Yli-Huttula, Chair of the FSHS Board of Trustees.
Improving the students’ access to services is a key goal at the FSHS. To achieve this goal, the most important tasks of the new Managing Director and the Management team will be improving the multi-channel service model and strengthening digital services.
”I am grateful for the confidence in me and excited on the verge of something new. I see the FSHS’s task to be significant and socially important, and therefore I have requested to resign from my current task as a Member of Parliament. Work at the FSHS is strongly future-oriented and serves the new generation. Education is a cornerstone of Finland’s success and we therefore need to invest in the wellbeing of the higher education students. Especially the growing need for mental health services challenges the FSHS to fulfil its task even better in the future”, says Annika Saarikko, the elected Managing Director.