The Teaching Profession in Europe Practices, Perceptions, and Policies Eurydice Report Education transmits important values such as freedom, self-expression and tolerance, and it contributes to active citizenship, social cohesion and integration. Education systems across Europe are facing structural challenges which are aggravated by the economic crisis: fragmentation, underinvestment, shortages of teachers and new technological developments calling for new learning models. Teachers play a crucial role in the lives of pupils. They guide them towards their goals and shape their perceptions. That is why ‘Education and Training 2020', Europe’s strategy in the field of education and training, puts a special emphasis on the role of teachers ~ from their selection, initial education and continuous professional development to their career opportunities. Investment in teachers is crucial, as reiterated in the Council Conclusions on effective teacher education in May 2014: Ministers agreed that Member States need to raise the quality of the teaching profession and make it more attractive and prestigious. This means that they have to carefully select and recruit teachers, provide them with effective education, retain them in the profession, give them early career support, and offer them regular opportunities to renew their skills and competences, including those based on new technologies‘The strategic framework for education and training (ET 2020) agreed by the Council of the European Union now guides policy-related action in these fields. It identifies the quality of education and training as one of four strategic objectives, stating that ‘there is 2 need to ensure high quality teaching, to provide adequate initial teacher education, continuous professional development for teachers and trainers, and to make teaching an attractive career-choice' (1), thereby ensuring that investment in human resources is a key factor in success. This Eurydice report examines several issues that crucially affect the quality of teaching in schools, as well as, potentially, the recruitment of new teachers. In so doing, it focuses on lower secondary education (ISCED 2) in the 28 EU Member States, as well as in Iceland, Liechtenstein, Montenegro, the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, Norway, Serbia, and Turkey, covering some 40 education systems in all This Eurydice report focuses on around 2 million teachers working in lower secondary education in Europe and on the education systems concerned. ‘The report examines five areas of primary importance for policy: (1) demographics and working conditions; (2) initial teacher education and the transition to the teaching profession; (3)ig professional development; (4) transnational mobility; and (5) attractiveness of the profession teacher OUR FOCUS is ON : Chapter 4, that discusses the transnational mobility of teachers for professional purposes, both during ITE and once they are in service. It considers aspects of mobility such as participation, how it may partly depend on the subject taught, various reasons for going abroad, and international mobility funding schemes. INTRODUCTION The current global socio-economic and technological context has placed education at the heart of Europe's strategy for sustainable competitiveness and development. Schools, however, face unprecedented challenges. Not only are they expected to deliver measurable results with reduced budgets, but also to be modern and forward-looking, offer an attractive curriculum, and prepare young people for as yet non-existent jobs. This renewed pressure on education systems impinges directly on the most important in-school factor affecting student attainment, namely the work of teachers. However, the teaching profession is not as attractive as previously. ‘The strategic framework for education and training (ET 2020) agreed by the Council of the European Union now guides policy-related action in these fields. It identifies the quality of education and training as one of four strategic objectives, stating that ‘there is a need toig professional development; (4) transnational mobility; and (5) attractiveness of the profession teacher OUR FOCUS is ON : Chapter 4, that discusses the transnational mobility of teachers for professional purposes, both during ITE and once they are in service. It considers aspects of mobility such as participation, how it may partly depend on the subject taught, various reasons for going abroad, and international mobility funding schemes. INTRODUCTION The current global socio-economic and technological context has placed education at the heart of Europe's strategy for sustainable competitiveness and development. Schools, however, face unprecedented challenges. Not only are they expected to deliver measurable results with reduced budgets, but also to be modern and forward-looking, offer an attractive curriculum, and prepare young people for as yet non-existent jobs. This renewed pressure on education systems impinges directly on the most important in-school factor affecting student attainment, namely the work of teachers. However, the teaching profession is not as attractive as previously. ‘The strategic framework for education and training (ET 2020) agreed by the Council of the European Union now guides policy-related action in these fields. It identifies the quality of education and training as one of four strategic objectives, stating that ‘there is a need toAJensure high quality teaching, 2)to provide adequate initial teacher education, 3) continuous professional development for teachers and trainers, and 4) to make teaching an attractive career-choice’ , thereby ensuring that investment in human resources is a key factor in success. This report offers a comparative analysis of different aspects of the teaching profession in Europe, in order to provide data relevant to policies that might enhance it, The report thus combines 1 )qualitative data on existing country-based regulations (for which the source is Eurydice) with 2)statistical data from the 2013 OECD Teaching and Learning International Survey (TALIS) on the attitudes, opinions, perceptions, and practices of teachers and school heads, and 3)statistical material from Eurostat/UOE on the teacher population in Europe. Transnational teacher mobility Within the EU, 27.4 % of teachers have been abroad at least once for professional purposes for at least a week. The proportion is highest in the Nordic and Baltic countries. In half of the education systems surveyed, less than a third of all teachers appear to be transnationally mobile. In the EU, 12.4 % of respondents reported that they had gone abroad solely when they were already practising teachers, whereas 5.9 % had done so only during their ITE, and 3.6 % only in both cases. In all countries surveyed except Iceland, modern foreign language teachers are the most transnationally mobile, compared to teachers of four other main subjects.However, the fact that within the EU almost 60 % of the former have been abroad for professional purposes also means that over 40 % of them have not, which might have negetive implications for the quality of foreign language teaching. Teachers of science and of mathematics in the EU are the least transnationally mobile for professional purposes with under 20 % of them in this category. Iceland constitutes a marked exception to these trends as it has the greatest proportion of transnationally mobile teachers, whose involvement in professional activity abroad is consistently high irrespective of their schaol subject. Transnational mobility occurs mainly in the case of teachers who 1Jare accompanying visiting students (44.2 % of teachers in the EU give this as their reason for going abroad),2) learning languages (39.6 %), 3)and studying abroad as part of their teacher education (37.8 %). Only 20.4 % state that they went abroad to teach. Top-level national schemes to support transnational teacher mobility exist in over half of the countries surveyed, most of them in western and northern Europe. However, the EU programme (now Erasmus) is by far the main source of funding. Almost a quarter of mobile teachers went abroad for professional purposes under the EU programme, compared to a tenth in the case of national or regional programmes. Furthermore, the existence of a national (top-level) scheme does not necessarily result in a higher proportion of transnationally mobile teachers.Besides, half of the countries with a mobility rate below the EU average have no national (top- level) mobility scheme. Eleven factors have been considered together to evaluate their predictive impact on transnational teacher mobility. In all countries except Iceland, modern foreign language teachers appear six times more likely to have been abroad for professional purposes. Participation in professional development activity in the 12 months preceding the survey was also a predictive factor in transnational mobility in the great majority of countries, but to a lesser extent. In 13 countries 1}those who have taught for over 10 years are more likely to be transnationally mobile. Finally, 2] permanent employee status and the 3)gender impact of ‘being a man’ have predictive value in just seven countries. The need to attract more appropriately qualified staff into the teaching profession is a growing priority