Brussels, 05/10/2015 (Agence Europe) - For World Teachers' Day, marked on 5 October, Eurostat, the EU's statistical office, published figures on the teaching staff by gender and by age in member states in 2013. What is immediately apparent is that women predominate. Also striking is that the average age of the teaching staff is growing older.
In 2013, 8.3 million persons worked as teaching staff (from pre-primary to tertiary level) in the European Union. 5.8 million (70%) were women. Women were largely predominant in the early stages of education, representing 95% of all teachers at pre-primary education level and 85% at primary level. At tertiary education level, the balance is somewhat reversed with the majority of teaching staff (59%) being men. Of the whole teaching staff across the EU in 2013, 820,000 (almost 10% of the total number) were under 30 years old and 2.9 million (around 36%) were aged 50 or older. The proportion of teachers aged 50 or older was highest in secondary schools (39.2%) and at tertiary education level (36.1%). (Original version in French by Isabelle Lamberty)