Study Guide

Students who are actively enrolled as degree students in a member university of the Finnish University Network for Asian Studies are eligible to take the courses free of charge.

The members of the Finnish University Network for Asian Studies are:

• University of Turku
• University of Jyväskylä ( including JAMK University of Applied Sciences)
• Tampere University (including Tampere University of Applied Sciences)

New! From August 2025 onwards, Asianet no longer arranges periodical application periods. Instead eligible students from member universities of the Finnish University Network for Asian Studies, register to the courses through their own institutions Peppi or Sisu system. Each course has its own registration period, please check the times from Peppi or Sisu.

Other interested persons can register as self-paying external non-degree students to UTU to take these courses and then register in UTU Peppi. Read more from the application instructions. If you already have a valid non-degree study right for Asianet courses, you can sign up to the courses in UTU Peppi.

Each course has its own registration period, please check the times from your institution’s Peppi or Sisu system and register.

After registering in Peppi or Sisu:

1. In most courses you will get an email invitation to the course site from the course teacher on the day the course starts.
2. Some courses are continuous, meaning you can register any time in Peppi or Sisu and start studying right away, without any notification from the teacher or Peppi/Sisu system about your registration, provided that you are eligible to study Asianet courses (see above).  Please read specific instructions from each course page.
3. Some of the advanced courses have maximum intake limit. In that case, students are selected in the order of application. The places are divided evenly between the member universities of the Network. Students will be informed of the decision before the course starts.

Students are asked to inform the Coordination Unit in case they are unable to take the courses they have been accepted to and to deregister from the course in Peppi or Sisu. 

For courses starting from September 2025 onwards, students, from the member universities of the Finnish University Network for Asian Studies, who have registered in Peppi or Sisu, will get their completed credits automatically registered in their own university’s study registry.

Credit registration is done within a few weeks after the course has ended.  

If you want to include our courses in your degree, check approval at your  home institute prior to course enrollment.

Self-paying students’ completed credits are automatically registered to UTU’s Peppi System.  In order to access the UTU Peppi Credit Registry, the UTU user account is needed. All accepted self-paying students get a UTU user account when they are first accepted to the courses. See below for instructions on “Where can I find my UTU student number”. The UTU account needs to be first activated via this website. Please read instructions on how to activate your UTU user account in Finnish and in English. After you have activated your UTU user account, log in to UTU Peppi to check your credits https://student.peppi.utu.fi. Self-paying non-degree students can find their UTU-student number in an automated e-mail that has been sent from the address disco@utu.fi, when you were accepted as a student in Asianet online studies. The e-mail is sent to the e-mail address that you gave in the application form.

Until end of August 2025, completed credits are not automatically transferred to the credit registry of the student’s university. The students are responsible for transferring the credits to their own university/department. Only students at the University of Turku will get their credits registered automatically, because the Asia Network is coordinated at the University of Turku.

Students track and transfer their credits by themselves. First, the credits can be tracked in the Peppi Credit Registry of the University of Turku, which is the Main Registry for Asianet courses.

In order to access the UTU Peppi Credit Registry, the UTU user account is needed. All Asianet students get a UTU user account when they are first accepted to the courses. You can find your UTU-student number in an automated e-mail that has been sent from the address disco@utu.fi, when you were accepted as a student in Asianet online studies. The e-mail is sent to the e-mail address that you gave in the application form.

The UTU account needs to be first activated via this website. Please read instructions on how to activate your UTU user account in Finnish and in English. After you have activated your UTU user account, log in to UTU Peppi to check your credits https://student.peppi.utu.fi

Exchange students who do not have online banking credentials and thus cannot activate their account on their own, can ask for the study transcript at opintosihteerit-yht@utu.fi

Students should go through their transcripts as soon as they become available and check the information thoroughly. If there are any mistakes they should contact the Network Coordination Unit immediately.

For the transfer of the credits, the “Puro” service is no longer in use at the University of Turku. We recommend that you use the “Oma Opintopolku” service to produce a link to your completed studies. Please check whether the study secretaries at your University accepts the link as a proof of your studies.

Read instructions for the use of “Oma Opintopolku” here

Students in universities that do not accept the “Oma Opintopolku -link”, can produce their credit transcript in the Peppi system of the University of Turku, and then bring it to their own university’s students services to transfer the credits. Access Peppi from this address: https://student.peppi.utu.fi

The University Network’s coordination unit will apply for a local student number when necessary. This will not incur any expenses to the student.

Although the main register is held at the University of Turku, credits from some courses that are not organized by the University of Turku may be registered at another university. This is because of bureaucratic reasons and does not incur any difficulties for the students. Also the credits will not be registered double.

When you have completed all required courses of a minor (Asian programme OR Mini Minor), please contact opintosihteerit-yht@utu.fi and ask to get the minor compiled.

Those students from the University of Turku who wish to complete the so called Integrated Minor in East Asian Studies (combining both the Asian Programme and the CEAS Minor in East Asian Studies), please contact the Centre for East Asian Studies, University of Turku.

The courses consist of various online learning tasks. More detailed course descriptions are available on the course pages.

Lectures

Lectures for all courses are only available on the online Moodle learning environment.

Most of the lecture videos are on Echo360, which can be viewed with a web browser on a computer, laptop, tablet or other mobile device.

Most of the computers available in the university computer labs are adequate for viewing lecture videos.

If you cannot find a suitable computer or encounter any problems please contact your local IT support at your home university.

It is advisable to bring your own headphones if you use computers in a computer lab. If you are not sure where to plug in the headphones, again, please contact your local IT support. (Usually headphones are plugged in either to the speaker or to the headset/output socket located on the rear of the CPU).

Essays

Instructions for essays are given on each courses own Moodle site.

All exams are so-called home exams (explained in more detail later).

Lecture and book exams are organised three times, and the student may choose the most suitable date. Students do not need to sign up for the exam if not stated otherwise in the course instructions.

Students are not required to take all three exams, one passed exam is enough. However, if the first examination fails, it is possible to take the exam on another given exam date.

The same applies if the student wishes to improve the grade.

If the student does not pass any of the three examinations, they can redo the whole course when and if it is arranged again.

Please check each courses own Moodle site for more detailed information about the examinations and how they are arranged.

“Home Exam”

In the home exams, the questions are available in the morning of the examination date  (Finnish time) on the course’s own Moodle site.

The examination can be taken wherever and whenever the student finds appropriate within the time period stated in the examination instructions.

Students submit their answers using the upload tool on the courses Moodle site.

Answers arriving late are failed automatically.

Examinations are done individually; any cooperation is strictly prohibited if not otherwise mentioned in the instructions of the specified course. Copying and plagiarizing is strictly prohibited and when discovered leads to failing automatically.

Grades

All the courses are graded from 1 to 5, where

0 = failed
1 = fair
2 = satisfactory
3 = good
4 = very good
5 = excellent

A Grade Point Average (GPA) is given to those students who have completed the whole Programme (minimum 25 ECTS).

There is no GPA for the Mini Minor nor for the separate courses.

Some courses or assignments may be also graded failed-passed or failed-passed-passed with honors.

Plagiarism

Asia Network’s Policy on Plagiarism

(from the CEAS/UTU Writing and Research Guide )

Derived from the Latin word plagiarius (”kidnapper”), plagiarism refers to the act of presenting another author’s work as your own. Although some plagiarism is intentional cheating (e.g., copying text from the internet and presenting it as your own work), some is unintentional and a result of poor documentation and citation practices.

The easiest way to make sure you do not commit plagiarism is to follow the established citation practices. […] When you feel that a phrase used by another scholar is significant enough to be repeated verbatim, you can do so by quoting it directly and referencing it appropriately. Make sure that you don’t overuse quotations in your text, though.

As a general rule, you don’t need to reference facts that are common knowledge or widely shared cultural references. But if you are discussing particular interpretations of such material, you should document your sources.

Rules applied when plagiarism is suspected

If a teacher suspects plagiarism in a student’s work, the work will be shown it to a colleague for a second opinion. If they feel that plagiarism has occurred, the teacher will contact the student.
The student will not be given a grade for the exam/work in question, unless the student can show that it is properly cited, or represents student’s own ideas.

In the case of grave or repeated plagiarism, the teacher may take other punitive measures in accordance with the rules of their Faculty. The usual punishment is a failed grade for the whole course.

Most of the study materials are available on the course’s Moodle site. Study materials may also include books, and articles which are available in library databases.

Literature

Member universities have been  asked to acquire all required examination books. Other courses materials are selected so that students should be able to access the materials without problems. However, please bear in mind that all books might not be readily available in all libraries.

If you cannot find a specific book in your local university, check the availability in other university libraries. It is possible to borrow books through interlibrary services.

Very often you can also buy the books for an affordable price from second hand online bookstores.

Others

Other study materials, for example lecture outlines, are distributed to students either through e-mail or the course’s own Moodle site.

The introductory MOOC courses are free for anyone to take.

Other online courses are free for all students who hold a valid study right at a member university of the University Network for Asian Studies.

Other students can participate in the online courses as self-paying students.

This study guide is only available through the internet at www.asianet.fi, and can be printed from here. No other kind of study guide will be provided.

The coordination unit of the Finnish University Network for Asian Studies is located at the Centre for East Asian Studies at the University of Turku .

Mailing Address:
Finnish University Network for Asian Studies
c/o Centre for East Asian Studies
20014 Turun yliopisto

Contacts:
Planning Officer Riina Karskela
opo-yht@utu.fi

University Teacher Silja Keva
silja.keva(at)utu.fi
tel. +358 29 450 3055

Director Outi Luova
outi.luova(at)utu.fi
tel.+358 29 450 3058