Initial teacher education 2024: why inclusion matters? (original) (raw)
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Teacher education for inclusion in Europe
PROSPECTS, 2011
Teacher education issues are high on the policy agenda across Europe. The United Nations Convention on the Rights of People with Disabilities is gaining momentum and providing a force for change, supported by many communications both internationally and at European level that recognize how central education is in efforts to develop a more equitable society. In moving towards a more inclusive education system, there is a need to train all teachers to meet the diverse needs of all learners in their classrooms and to work collaboratively with colleagues. Drawing on key documents, this article outlines the policy context and reviews the available evidence supporting the move towards teacher education for inclusion across Europe. It presents the work of the European Agency for Development in Special Needs Education, to highlight some of the opportunities and challenges within its member countries in addressing teacher education for inclusion.
Barriers to Educational Inclusion in Initial Teacher Training
Societies, 2023
Initial teacher training within the framework of an inclusive school constitutes a fundamental challenge in order to meet the needs of 21st century society. The 2030 agenda establishes in the target of goal four the need for well-qualified teachers, capable of developing inclusive educational responses to the diversity of the needs of the students enrolled in their centres. The objective of this article is to analyse the perception of the school community regarding the initial training of future teachers in providing an inclusive and quality educational response for all students. The design was qualitative, non-experimental and descriptive. The participants were 78 people involved in teacher training and the educational exclusion–inclusion processes in the region of Murcia (Spain). The information collection techniques were 39 semi-structured interviews and 10 focus groups. The analysis of the information was carried out through an inductive categorization process, classifying the information into different analysis codes with the Atlas.Ti program (V. 8). The results of the work indicate that with regard to inclusive education, there is a clear shortfall in the initial training of teachers, a limitation in the acquisition of competences regarding attention to diversity, the presence of theoretical learning which has limited relevance to practical intervention, and a training approach anchored in models from the past which refers to student deficiencies. This work has the value of providing an insight into the barriers present in initial training from the perspective of all the educational actors involved in the educational system, which has not been sufficiently investigated in this field of study.
This paper attempts to highlight and examine the Romanian perspective regarding inclusive education by presenting some statistical data and the steps that have been made in order to make the switch from a school system lead by the segregation principle to a school system based on inclusive principles. Moreover, the attention focuses on the schools` key actors, the teachers, more specifically on the initial teacher training programmes available in Romania. The starting point, when it come to the initial teacher training programmes, is based on the assumption that there is an acute need for training when it comes to the implementation of an inclusive educational system in Romania. Using a qualitative approach, we aimed at presenting the specialists' opinion on priority issues in policy development regarding teacher training in the field of inclusive education, focusing on the premises for implementing a training system that is mandatory for every teacher in inclusive education and on the aspects that relate to the rethinking of the teacher's training process at a national level.
Enhancing teacher education for inclusion
European Journal of Teacher Education
As the demographic profiles of many education systems continue to change, the challenges facing the teaching workforce and how teachers are prepared to address different aspects of diversity are leading many European countries to reform teacher education policy in support of inclusive education. This move aligns with the 2018 European Union Council Recommendation on promoting common values, inclusive education, and the European dimension of teaching, which noted that: [h]igh quality inclusive education and training at all levels, is essential in ensuring social mobility and inclusion. .. and a deeper understanding of our common values (European Commission 2018, p1). As an implementing measure, the Commission recommended that teachers, school leaders and academic staff be enabled to: promote common values and deliver inclusive education, through: (a) measures to empower teachers, school leaders and academic staff helping them convey common values, and promote active citizenship while transmitting a sense of belonging and responding to the diverse needs of learners (17). The European Charter of Fundamental Rights delineates the common values of the EU as respect for human dignity, freedom, democracy, equality, the rule of law and respect for human rights, including the rights of persons belonging to minorities. These values were recently reaffirmed on the 10th anniversary of the Charter's integration within the Treaty of Lisbon in October 2019 (Council of the European Union 2019). They have been supported by a strategic framework for European cooperation in education and training, the Education and Training 2020 (ET2020) agenda to develop education and training systems in the Member States to:. .. ensure that all learnersincluding those from disadvantaged backgrounds, those with special needs and migrantscomplete their education. .. Education should promote intercultural competences, democratic values and respect for fundamental rights and the environment, as well as combat all forms of discrimination, equipping all young people to interact positively with their peers from diverse backgrounds' (ibid. p.7). While there are many efforts to address these common values, questions remain about how teachers can be better prepared to respond to the diverse needs of learners in today's schools. These questions are part of a wider discussion about how teachers are prepared to work within a rights-based policy framework of inclusive education, a valuesbased approach to education intended to combat all forms of discrimination and exclusion (UNESCO 2018). They represent an important step in considering how teacher educators engage with the challenge of preparing teachers to deal with difference, remove barriers to participation and implement policies of inclusive education. These discussions occur within and across national contexts which offer different programmes of teacher education and different routes into teaching. The many variations in how teachers are prepared suggests that a consideration of programme structure may be fundamental to deliberations about how shared concerns of equity and inclusion in
Initial Teacher Education for Inclusion Phase 1 and 2 Report: NCSE Research Report No. 26
2018
Executive Summary Background to the project The context for this project is a growing international consensus on the importance of policy initiatives to both raise the quality of teaching (OECD, 2005) and to better prepare teachers to respond to increasing diversity in communities and classrooms (EADSNE, 2011). The DES and the Teaching Council of Ireland developed policies requiring higher education institutions providing Initial Teacher Education (ITE) to undergo a re-accreditation process from 2012. This involved both an extension and a reconceptualization of programmes, with mandatory additional content related to inclusive education and differentiation, together with the opportunity for a wider range of school placement experiences. All concurrent (undergraduate) programmes of initial teacher education must be of four years' duration and all consecutive (postgraduate) programmes of initial teacher education must be of two years' duration. The latter were re-accredited at...
2013
This paper describes the European Agency for Development in Special Needs Education project on Teacher Education for Inclusion which involved experts from 25 European countries. It sets out the policy context in Europe and stresses the need to strengthen teacher education in order to meet current policy priorities. The authors provide a summary of the TE4I project !ndings from Agency member countries and outline the project key messages. They describe the development of a Pro!le of Inclusive Teachers and the early impact of this and other project outcomes.