Held on both campuses, the event celebrated the Alumni of the Year, featured talks on what makes a good life and offered opportunities to look back on student days.
“Alumni Day was an inspiring event for the entire academic community. Keeping in touch with our alumni is rewarding for our teachers, and our alumni are an important resource as we develop our teaching,” said Tapio Määttä, Rector of the University of Eastern Finland, who opened the event on the Kuopio Campus.
On the Joensuu Campus, the event was opened by Ilkka Huhta, Dean of the Philosophical Faculty. He reminded attendees that alumni are still part of the university: they remain members of the academic community – their offices just happen to be located elsewhere.
Recognised as this year’s Alumni of the Year were Nordic combined athlete Ilkka Herola, who studied business, cross-country skier Inkki Inola, who studied business and law, and biathlete Suvi Minkkinen, who studied business.
Both campuses hosted inspiring talks on what makes a good life and offered opportunities to look back on student days.
In Kuopio, the keynote speech was delivered by Pippa Laukka, a specialist in sports and exercise medicine, a media personality and an alumna of the University of Kuopio. She reminded attendees that universities set in motion chains of events whose effects become visible only years later. People do not act as they are taught to but take their cues from what happens around them and how others act. We cannot entirely determine the course of our lives, but we can influence the mark we leave.
In Joensuu, the keynote speech was delivered by Professor Arto O. Salonen. He encouraged alumni to consider whether, now that the stage was set in terms of their standard of living, it was time to focus on the storyline: their quality of life. We need to move from human-centred thinking to life-centred thinking that also cares for nature, from disconnection to belonging and from overconsumption to moderation. A good future is built together.
The afternoon programme continued with visits to departments, where alumni heard about the latest research in their fields and had opportunities to network. Alumni could also join campus tours and visit laboratories. In Kuopio, they explored urban agriculture and berry cultivation, while in Joensuu they visited SenseLab, a facility for multisensory research.
At the evening event in Joensuu, the party band Flow got alumni dancing. Alumnus Harri Kontturi, a lawyer and holder of the honorary title laamanni, and Member of Parliament Krista Mikkonen shared memories of their student days. Kontturi helped establish the University of Joensuu’s alumni association, which held its first evening get-together 25 years ago.
Mikkonen reminded attendees that, as a university, we must ensure that our current students also have opportunities to build a sense of community that will bring them back to alumni events decades from now. Many of today’s global challenges call for even greater collaboration across disciplines and university units.
The evening event in Kuopio opened with remarks by Sari Rissanen, Vice Dean for Research and Professor in the Department of Social Sciences. The performers included the university’s own alumni band Phi_6 and the party band Lush.
According to attendee feedback, the highlights of the day included seeing old friends, the activities organised by the departments and informal socialising. Those attending Alumni Day had graduated between 1978 and 2026.
Thank you to everyone who took part in our Alumni Day!
