European Trade Union Committee for Education

• ICT in Education
• ETUCE Taskforce on ICT
• ELFE-ESL Project (2011-2014)
• ELFE 2 Project (2008-2009)
• ELFE 1 Project (2004-2005)
• ELFE Schools

Taskforce to Develop a Policy on the 21st Century Teaching Profession and the Use of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT)

Introduction

This ETUCE taskforce has been set up as a result of the ETUCE - European Region of Education International 2014 Special Conference, titled The Future of the Teaching Profession, in Vienna on 26 to 27 November 2014. At this event, the delegates adopted the Resolution on Shaping the Teaching Profession of the 21st Century and decided to commission a taskforce with drafting a policy paper onthe 21st Century Teaching Profession and the Use of ICT that is to be presented for adoption to the ETUCE Conference in 2016.

For this purpose, the ETUCE Bureau selected from the nominations received from the member organisations, teacher union delegates to the taskforce who are experts in the field, taking into consideration a balanced representation of the different levels of education, the geographical coverage of the European region as well as regarding gender aspects. They are to draft the paper and to present the draft at the ETUCE Committee in spring 2016.

Addressing the need for action on this topic, the policy paper is rooted in the previous policy work of ETUCE, such as the Resolution on the Future of the Teaching Profession and the EI Education Policy Paper adopted by the 6th EI Congress in Cape Town in 2011, the Resolution on the Teaching Profession adopted by the ETUCE Conference in Budapest in 2012, the ETUCE Policy Paper 'Teacher Education in Europe' the ETUCE Key Messages for what is needed to improve quality education in Europe developed in the Unite for Quality Education Campaign, and other existing ETUCE policy papers.

Taskforce members

The taskforce consists of eight experts in innovation and ICT in education from ETUCE member organisations. Odile Cordelier, ETUCE Vice-President and member of the ETUCE Bureau chairs the taskforce. The ETUCE Secretariat supports the work of the taskforce.

Members of the taskforce are:

- Roland Gangl, GÖD, Austria
- Loucas Tsoukkas, POED, Cyprus
- Martina Schmerr, GEW, Germany
- Bert Iimminga, Algemene Onderwijsbond, The Netherlands
- Elżbieta Gajek, ZNP, Poland
- Alexandre Dias, FNE, Portugal
- Anca Sipos, ALMA MATAR, Romania
- Eva Kohler, Lärarförbundet, Sweden

Content

With the purpose of ensuring that teacher unions and education staff shape the future of the teaching profession and remain at the forefront of the developments concerning innovation in education and in the teaching profession, the policy paper  is to address European, national, regional and local education authorities and to include different topics concerning the 21st Century Teaching Profession and the use of ICT in Education, covering such essential topics as academic freedom as well as inclusive and free of charge education for all. This includes the broader topics of:

• teaching tools (e.g. allocation of resources, privatisation, open education recourses and massive open online course);
• teaching skills and competences (e.g. teachers' and students' digital competences, personal and data protection, copyright issues);
• Education staff's working environment (e.g. working time, workload, wide ranging requirements of teachers).

Timeframe

In order for the policy paper to be presented at the ETUCE Conference in 2016, it is to be discussed by the ETUCE Bureau at the beginning of 2016 and in the ETUCE Committee in spring 2016.