Europe is experiencing a severe teacher shortage. In some countries already, early childhood education institutions remain closed, pupils remain without Maths and other classes because there are not enough teachers. Increasingly, education professionals are exposed to precarious working conditions, short term-contracts and the lack of sustainable career perspectives. In addition, professional autonomy and academic freedom are under pressure. Young professionals are no longer attracted to teaching while at the same time, experienced teachers are leaving the profession. For many years, education trade unions have been warning that without serious efforts to raise the status of the teaching profession, students and young people would be deprived of their right to quality inclusive education. Education is a public good and a human right and Europe absolutely needs to focus now on promoting the attractiveness of the teaching profession if it does not want to fail its young people and jeopardise our future. To bring about change, education authorities and governments must provide sustainable public investment in education for decent working conditions and salaries of teaching professionals. Teachers and other education professionals deserve our deepest respect for the contribution they make to our society. We need to give them back their professional autonomy and value this crucial profession.
Therefore to celebrate education professionals and raise awareness on the most pressing issues for education workers in Europe, ETUCE organises for the first time the European Week of Teachers from 2 to 6 October 2023. During the whole week, education trade unions from across Europe will be organising actions at national, regional and local level.
ETUCE will open the week with an online event on Monday 2 October 2023. Among the many actions, feature a presentation from the European Commission, Directorate General Education, Youth, Sport and Culture,about promoting the attractiveness of the teaching profession from the European Commission perspective; in light of the Spanish Presidency of the EU, the Minister of Education of Spain, Pilar Alegria will give an interview and show the Presidency‘s perspective, Susan Flocken, ETUCE European Director, will talk with the EU Observer about the essential conditions that are necessary to value and raise the status of the teaching. During the whole week, ETUCE will be publishing the events and celebrations of member organisations and about what is happening in their countries from Kazakhstan to Portugal, from Iceland to Cyprus. ETUCE and its member organisations will be raising their voice to give a maximum of visibility to the important work of teachers and their unions and their crucial contribution to society.
ETUCE has launched its two-year campaign #Making Teaching Attractive (Make teaching attractive! - European Trade Union Committee for Education (csee-etuce.org)). The campaign is based on 10 key messages on how to raise the status of the teaching profession (10 key demands - European Trade Union Committee for Education (csee-etuce.org). Each month is dedicated to one message. In October the campaign focuses on strong and meaningful social dialogue and collective bargaining. The main messages of the campaign are to value, invest in, and attract to the teaching profession. With this campaign ETUCE aims to enhance the visibility and reputation of education trade unions across Europe and to strengthen ETUCE’s and member organisations’ networks. Moreover, our objective is to raise public awareness of the need to enhance the status and raise the attractiveness of the teaching profession.
What can you do during the European Week of Teachers?
You can print the ETUCE campaign logo (campaign Toolkit) take photos with it and publish it on your social media using the campaign hashtag #MakeTeachingAttractive!. Redirect your audience to the campaign website.
Help ETUCE share your content, please use the hashtag #MakeTeachingAttractive consistently and tag @ETUCE_CSEE (Twitter) and @EuropeanTradeUnionCommitteeForEducation (Facebook).
Check out all activities from member organisations for the European Week of Teachers!
2-6 October 2023 On 15 May 2023, at the launch event of the campaign to promote the attractiveness of the teaching profession, ETUCE representing more than 11 million teachers in Europe invited its member organisations, education trade unions, for...
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