.gif){kind=small}
BACK TO HOME
PAGE BACK TO HOME
PAGE EUROPEAN REVIEW
THE EUROPEAN UNION'S VOCATIONAL EDUCATION programme, known as Leonardo da Vinci, is helping to contribute to the goal of the European education system being a 'world quality reference' by 2010. Its transnational, innovative projects require the involvement of partners from different Member States and now 32 of them have been chosen as 'Success Stories'. They include the 'Supporting Online Learning and Teaching' project designed to encourage e-learning in small businesses. This involved partners from eleven EU countries led by e-Novate consultancy of Margate who produced a CD and web site to provide a framework for learning.
The need to widen the reach of education systems in the EU was underlined by a recent report by the Commission examining how far targets set by the Lisbon process are being met. It draws attention to the 16% of the 18-24 age group who left school prematurely; the target here is to reduce this figure to 10% by 2010. On science, Lisbon requires a 15% increase in the number of Mathematics, Science and Technology graduates in the ten years from 2000 and progress towards this has been good, particularly in the UK, France and Ireland. The rate of adult participation in education has gone up from 7.9% to 9.4% since 2000, this should hit 12.5% for 2010.
Two other areas of education that demand greater efforts by the EU and Member States are teacher training and language teaching. One million new teachers must be recruited just to replace those retiring in the next 10 years while European pupils currently learn an average of 1.6 foreign languages in the top years of secondary school instead of the 2 needed to attain the Lisbon objective
|
Back to |
Up to |
