The EU Council’s working group on education will discuss draft conclusions on Tuesday 4 January on the issue of European mobility for trainee teachers.
The European Network on Education Systems, ‘Eurydice’, found in a report published in 2021 that a minority of teachers in the EU had travelled abroad at least once for professional purposes, either in the course of their career, their studies or both.
“There are substantial differences in the rate of participation between European countries, but also between subjects taught, as transnational mobility remains too often a prerogative of language teachers”, the EU Council says in its draft conclusions, citing the Eurydice report.
According to the report, only 20% of lower secondary school teachers reported in 2018 that they had gone abroad during their studies.
However, transnational mobility contributes “to the development of a wide range of competences among teachers”, the EU Council says, adding that the extent of teacher mobility in initial and in-service training “should be monitored at Member State and European levels”.
In its draft conclusions, of which EUROPE has obtained a copy, the institution insists first of all on the need to remove the main obstacles to this mobility: its financing and its academic recognition.
On this second point, the EU Council notes in particular that teacher education programmes rarely offer the possibility of engaging in mobility “without risking the completion of the degree”. It also notes that teaching assistantships in other EU countries are not recognised as equivalent to national school-based training.
It therefore considers inviting the EU27 to integrate transnational mobility into the system of teacher education and training - both for initial and in-service training - and to facilitate the official recognition of the results of such mobility.
The institution should also call on Member States to promote “recommended periods” in school years or initial training programmes for participation in mobility.
The EU Council should also take advantage of the draft conclusions to ask the EU27 to promote the integration of European training modules into initial and in-service teacher training.
The European Commission will certainly be asked to develop a European mobility framework for teachers and trainers.
Finally, it is not excluded that the EU Council will define a target number of teachers to have experienced a period of mobility in the EU by 2030. However, no precise numbers have been established at this stage. The idea will be discussed by national experts on 4 January. (Original version in French by Agathe Cherki)