How do we best shape our future and respond to the deep structural changes and challenges facing Europe?
For us, the answer is clear: we need to build resilience – at the individual, economic and societal level. This is the key to empowering EU citizens, enabling them to be in control of their lives, find or create a job they want, make the most of their talents and become engaged, confident members of society.
It is crucial in keeping our economy competitive and boosting innovation and creativity. And resilience is the glue that will enable us to build inclusive, fair societies.
Education, training, lifelong learning, mobility and transnational cooperation are critical in boosting resilience today and will be even more so in the future: providing basic and high-level skills and competences, reducing inequalities, promoting entrepreneurial mindsets, fostering inclusive, stable and democratic societies, and making a success of migration and globalisation.
Of course Member States are responsible for their education systems, but the European Union has a vital role to play in helping to drive reform and modernisation. And we have made good progress, for instance reducing the number of young people who drop out of school without a diploma. But we need to do more.
We have to be more ambitious in our cooperation. And that is why the European Commission has set out bold new objectives and benchmarks – endorsed by heads of State and government at the EU Social Summit in Gothenburg on November 17.
Our education systems must be inclusive, efficient and effective. They must equip people with the competences and attitudes they need to keep adapting to change throughout their lives and seize new opportunities. They must offer equal opportunities to all so that we can build a fairer society. And we must do more to harness the potential of education to bring Europeans closer together and help build open, strong communities.
To achieve this, we have proposed to work jointly with Member States towards a true European Education Area. This will involve mutual recognition of higher education and school-leaving diplomas, as well as a network of European universities that will enable world-class institutions to work seamlessly together across borders.
We believe that, by 2025, all young Europeans finishing upper secondary education should have a good knowledge of two languages in addition to their mother tongue
We also want to make mobility for all a reality: to date Erasmus+ and its predecessors have enabled nine million people to study, train, teach or volunteer abroad, 24,000 of them from Malta. This is a great achievement, but we can do much better.
That is why we want to at least double the number of participants, from 3.7 to 7.5 per cent by 2025 – which will require significantly more funding.
We also want to agree on new and more ambitious targets with Member States. For instance, we want to strengthen benchmarks for the share of low achievers and early school leavers, lowering the former from 15 to 10 per cent and the latter from 10 to five per cent.
A person needs to acquire skills and competences throughout life’s stages. We want to start early and promote high-quality early childhood education and care, and for the later stages set a more ambitious benchmark for the participation in lifelong learning to 25 per cent by 2025.
We also believe that, by 2025, all young Europeans finishing upper secondary education should have a good knowledge of two languages in addition to their mother tongue. Further targets could be agreed for digital competences and entrepreneurship requiring, for example, that every young person in Europe has at least one hands-on entrepreneurial experience before they leave school.
No real change can happen without teachers. The quality of education is strongly linked to the knowledge, skills and abilities of Europe’s six million teachers. They play a key role in equipping young people with the right competences and in modernising education. That is why we have to do better in supporting them.
They must be able to develop their own skills and competences through initial education and continuous professional development. And we have to work together to ensure that the teaching profession enjoys higher prestige, better pay and more autonomy. To support this, we want to further boost the number of teachers participating in the eTwinning online platform – which is already the biggest teachers’ network in the world – and offer policy guidance on the professional development of teachers and school leaders.
All these initiatives have one common aim: empowering individuals so they can make the most of their lives and so we can build fair, resilient economies and societies.
Education is the key that enables people to lead fulfilling lives, confidently and with respect and empathy for others.
And it is crucial in enabling all of us to shape the future. We need to ensure education delivers for all, across Europe.
We are ready to work with Member States to make this happen.
Jyrki Katainen is European Commission vice-president and Tibor Navracsics is commissioner for education, culture, youth and sport.