Mari-Pauliina Vainikainen is a Professor of Learning and Instruction at the Faculty of Education and Culture at Tampere University. She leads the Research Centre for Education, Assessment and Learning (REAL), which operates at the universities of Tampere, Helsinki, and Jyväskylä. Her background is in educational psychology and special education. Since the beginning of 2000s, she has been working on large-scale international, national, and local educational assessments. Her research has focused on the development of thinking skills and learning to learn competencies as well as on educational support.