Helena Kekkonen

Pulmu Helena Kekkonen née Nousiainen (1926–2014) was a Finnish peace activist and pioneer of peace education. A graduate in chemistry, while working as an educator at the central prison in Sörnäinen, she was inspired by the Brazilian Paulo Freire's 1968 work Pedagogy of the Oppressed. As a result, she started to encourage the prisoners to choose the subjects of their courses and discuss issues of universal concern as well as their own problems. From 1974 to 1986, she served as secretary general of the free educational association Vapaan Sivistystyön Yhteisjärjestön and thereafter of the peace education institut Rauhankasvatusinstituutin (1986–1990). She is remembered in particular for arranging international peace education meetings each year in Finland. For her national and international efforts to foster peace initiatives among educators, Kekkonen was the first person to be awarded the UNESCO Prize for Peace Education when it was initiated in 1981.

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