All Change and no change! A 'new' Secretary General and English continues to be needed across the whole school system irrespective of the UK Referendum result

Change characterises the new school year and this was reflected in the first two agenda items of the October meeting of the Joint Teaching Committee (JTC) of the European Schools:

  • First, we have a new Secretary General (in fact an 'old' face - the former Deputy, Giancarlo Marcheggiano) who was elected by the Board of Governors on 31st August and who made time to join INTERPARENTS at our preparatory meeting for the JTC, (hosted by the Laeken PA) to discuss the priorities ahead.
  • Second, in the wake of the UK referendum, we still don't know what Brexit means exactly but it is clearly recognised that this is a major concern for the whole school system. The line from the Secretariat General remains emphatically that the European Schools need English right across the system, starting with EN sections for the wide range of pupils who have EN as their L1. The new SG pointed out that English is also the predominant L2 across the system, (affecting both language learning and subjects taught in L2. In fact, almost without exception, every child needs EN in his or her school career.) As underlined repeatedly by INTERPARENTS however, the new SG confirmed that a key challenge is how to go on providing the necessary EN teachers and he confirmed that this is being studied in the context of risk assessment and mitigation. Your input into this process is welcomed by INTERPARENTS.

What do our children learn and how well do they learn it?

A lot of the JTC meeting focused on what our children learn and how their attainment is measured. In preparation for the phased introduction of the new marking system in S1-5 in September 2017, the inspectors have been developing 'attainment descriptors' for all syllabuses - i.e. what an 'excellent' performance would look like versus 'very good', or 'good' etc. The idea is that these descriptors would facilitate a more harmonised approach to marking e.g. across sections. For the new syllabuses based on competences to be achieved by the pupils, we can see distinct levels of attainment described. However, for some older syllabuses, it is less clear how the new bands will be applied in marking. The teachers and INTERPARENTS have asked at least for more examples of how to apply the new scale for these subjects. Much rests on the teacher training which begins formally this Spring. On top of the work to develop attainment descriptors for existing syllabuses, nine updates to syllabuses were approved. These will be uploaded to the www.eursc.eu site under the new-look 'Studies and Certificates' section.

BAC to the Future

The Baccalaureate continues to be the focus of much improvement effort. Reports on the management of the 2016 written and oral exam sessions were given although the usual breakdown of results was not available for analysis in time for the meeting. However, the Head of the Baccalaureate Unit gave an update on work being done to introduce online marking and the Chair of the 2016 Examining Board (Danish Professor Winsløw) presented his report which included many useful insights and suggestions. He recognised the importance of teachers as the 'driving engine' of the schools and highlighted that more attention should be given to professional development. He also questioned the degree of internal assessment in the Baccalaureate and wondered whether it would be a good idea to reduce the weight of the PreBac. This topic is another on which INTERPARENTS seeks your input via your representatives.

Resourcing to sustain our schools

Locally hired teachers were of course again on the agenda, reflecting the system's increasing dependence on these teachers. An example came with the proposal to approve the inclusion of locally hired teachers in discipline councils. Following the Board of Governors' approval of a new statute in April, a schedule of formal evaluation of locally hired teachers has to be organised. However, it is still not clear how the extra workload will be managed and by whom. INTERPARENTS was one of several voices asking in the JTC what the impact would be for schools with a high proportion of locally hired teachers. Moreover, we reiterated a request for pupils to be routinely consulted in the evaluation process and finally, we sought assurances that locally recruited educational support teachers and assistants would be included. On the subject of Educational Support, only slight amendments to the Educational Support Policy and accompanying procedural document were presented to this meeting of the JTC. INTERPARENTS highlighted a rather long list of topics which parents are expecting to be examined by the relevant policy group and brought to subsequent meetings for approval. Again, resourcing seems to be an ongoing issue for coordination of educational support and your feedback on this is sought by your representatives so that INTERPARENTS can take your insights forward into the Policy Group looking at these issues.

Inter-school collaboration

The JTC meeting ended with a proposal from the German Presidency for a new European Schools Festival of the Arts. This initiative was welcomed, with the only caveat that the heavy organisational implications must be carefully considered. This could be an opportunity to collaborate more closely with the accredited schools, their representative expressing interest in hosting the first event. The logistical challenge of hosting and participating in inter-school events had been recognised earlier in the meeting in relation to the European Schools Science Symposium, now in its 14th edition. In all cases, the support of the parent community is needed. This is also the case for the European Schools Mobility programme (formerly known as the Exchange Programme). New Guidelines on this are expected to be approved shortly following extensive input from INTERPARENTS as part of the Working Group.