Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2008-09-22-Speech-1-188"
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"en.20080922.26.1-188"2
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"Mr President, distinguished Members of Parliament, I warmly welcome this report, especially as I am the Commissioner responsible for education. I would like to thank Mrs Maria Badia i Cutchet and the Committee on Culture and Education for their work.
Like you, the Commission believes that all Member States face significant challenges as they seek to improve their educational and training systems, especially vis-à-vis higher quality. We have talked repeatedly – and I remind you again – of the importance of key competences as well as equity and efficiency in our systems. These challenges cannot be met or reflected in a full sense without a high quality in the teaching profession, which is key to all of this. The quality of teachers is the critical factor for the modernisation of our education system and the achievement of equity and efficiency. Without such teachers, it is difficult to achieve any improvement.
The particular challenges faced by teachers are increasing as economic, social and educational contexts become more complex and schools and classrooms become more heterogeneous and more diverse. In the debate on the first report this evening we spoke of creativity and innovation. We can only achieve higher creativity and innovation in pupils if we have creative and innovative teachers in our schools.
We need to attract the very best candidates into the teaching profession. We need to give them the best possible preparation for their career and – most importantly – we need to continue training and developing all our teachers throughout their careers. This is – as you said, Mrs Badia i Cutchet – about the recruitment and salaries of teachers.
Every teacher must also be an autonomous learner, constantly reflecting on the way she or he teaches, learning from her or his peers and seeking new ways to develop knowledge and skills and to meet the individual needs of pupils. Every teacher must also be a lifelong learner. He or she cannot teach lifelong learning if he or she is not a lifelong learner. An initial education of three or four years can never be enough to equip a teacher for a lifetime of teaching. Only if teachers continue to learn can they keep up to date and provide learning that is truly relevant to their pupils.
I was very pleased to note that there is such a large consensus on these issues – as indeed there was in the Council among Ministers last November.
We must now work to build on these good intentions and this consensus to put in place real improvements in teacher education. We need to encourage Member States to invest more in developing their teaching staff. Three or four days of in-service training per year is simply not enough. Induction support for new teachers also needs to be improved and extended. We need to encourage Member States to improve the quality of in-service training and ensure that it provides the kinds of practical teaching skills that teachers really need today and tomorrow.
We need to promote school leadership. Schools these days are major organisations affecting the lives of hundreds of thousands of people. They need to be well-administered and well-managed, but most of all they need to be well-led by a leadership team with a clear vision of high quality education for all of its pupils.
Thank you once again for your report and your commitment. I look forward to continuing not only our discussions, but especially our cooperation on this important issue."@en1
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