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1. What is the main task of the Directorate General Education and Culture? How is that carried out?

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1. What is the main task of the Directorate General Education and Culture? How is that carried out?

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The Directorate General Education and Culture (EAC) of the European Commission is responsible for education and training, youth, sport, languages and culture.

The European Agenda for culture, which is the framework for the DG EAC’s activities in this field, aims to strengthen the role and position of culture in the context of increasing globalization. DG EAC develops a policy based on concrete data and manages initiatives such as the Creative Europe program, which defends European cultural heritage.

As the EU’s executive body, the European Commission is accountable to the European Parliament and, more specifically, to the Committee on Culture and Education.

The DG EAC focuses on policy cooperation, helping countries learn from one another and work together to improve education across Europe. One example is the Erasmus + programme, which aims to improve education and training in Europe, while providing people, at any stage of their life, with learning opportunities.

Furthermore, DG EAC also manages the Creative Europe Programme, which finances hundreds of programmes in support of artists, actors, and musicians. The aim is to promote cultural diversity and intercultural dialogue.

Eléonore Guillou

https://ec.europa.eu/programmes/creative-europe/culture

http://ec.europa.eu/programmes/erasmus-plus/node_en

http://ec.europa.eu/education/

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2. Who is in charge of the DG? Who does s/he report to? How well does s/he do their job? 

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2. Who is in charge of the DG? Who does s/he report to? How well does s/he do their job? 

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The European Commissioner for Education, Culture, Youth and Sport, Mr Tibor Navracsics, provides the political leadership for the Education and Culture Directorate General (DG EAC), executing the mandate of the President and answering to the College of Commissioners, which is itself held accountable to the European Parliament.

Tibor Navracsics is in charge of the Directorate General, his responsibilities are to:

→  identify how to invest in and modernize Europe’s education systems, so that they help people to find rewarding work and support economic growth.

→ Strengthening partnerships between universities and the world of work and expanding international student exchanges through Erasmus+. Erasmus +is the EU’s programme to support education, training, youth and sport in Europe. Its budget of around 15€ billion will provide opportunities for over 4 million Europeans to study, train, gain experience and volunteer abroad.

This program managed by the European Commission supports the overall management of this program, including: managing the budget, setting the priorities, identifying the programme’s targets and criteria, monitoring and guiding the implementation, follow-up and evolution of the programme.

→ Helping to reach the targets of the Europe 2020 strategy in the field of education. From 2016 to 2020 the European Commission has proposed some new priorities, like developing better skills, increasing employability, higher innovation capacity, development of citizenship, equality and social cohesion, etc. The European Commission wants to insist on education and considers the diversity with a quality and efficiency of education training, equity, social cohesion and active citizenship, creativity and innovation.

→ Promoting our cultural diversity by helping Europe’s artists and creators to reach new audiences and exploit new media. One example is the framework programme that the European Commission is involved with called Creative Europe, which supports the cultural and audiovisual sectors. Amongst other things, Creative Europe supports initiatives for the translation and promotion of literary works across EU markets, with one goal: increasing access to and readership of high quality European literature. The European Commission wants to revive the culture also with financial support for European platforms, which include activities like: fostering the mobility and visibility of creators and artists, stimulating a genuine Europe-wide programming of cultural and artistic activities, contributing to audience development and providing visibility to Europe’s values and different cultures. The Creative Europe programme also provides support for European networks to help the cultural and creative sectors to operate transnationally and to strengthen their competitiveness.

Furthermore, the programme supports transnational cooperation projects involving cultural and creative organizations from different countries taking part in the programme.

It aims to improve access to European culture and creative works and to promote innovation and creativity.

→ Promoting culture as a catalyst for innovation, economic growth and new jobs.

→ Empowering young people of all social and cultural backgrounds so that they can participate fully in civic and democratic life.

The Director-General of the DG, Martine Reicherts, is responsible for ensuring the execution of the political mandate, as well as reporting to the Commissioner, providing policy recommendations, and ensuring the sound management of the DG on a day-to-day basis.

They report to the European Parliament.

Eléonore Guillou

Sources:

https://ec.europa.eu/programmes/creative-europe/culture

http://ec.europa.eu/programmes/erasmus-plus/node_en

http://ec.europa.eu/education/

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3. What structure does the DG have? How does it function?

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3. What structure does the DG have? How does it function?

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The DG EAC is a service of the European commission. It is the executive branch of the European Union in the field of education, training, youth, sports, languages and culture.

It oversees the European Union's Education, Audiovisual and Culture Executive Agency (EACEA). The EACEA is fully operational since the 1st of January 2006 and is an executive agence for some of the programs / parts of the European Union programs for education, training, youth, sport, audiovisual, culture, on DG EAC's behalf.

Organization of the DG EAC

DG EAC is led by:

→  Tibor Navracsics, who is the Commissioner in charge of DG DEAC since 22 October 2014. He provides the political leadership for the DG EAC, executing the mandate of the President and answering to the College of Commissioners.

→   Martine Reicherts, the Director-General of the DG and responsible of ensuring the execution of the political mandate, as well as reporting to the Commissioner, providing policy recommendations, and ensuring the sound management of the DG on a day-to-day basis.

She is the head (DG) of 5 directorates:

Directorate A: Policy Strategy and Evaluation

Directorate B: Youth, Education and Erasmus+

Directorate C: Innovation, International Cooperation and Sport

Directorate D: Culture and Creativity

Directorate E: Performance Management, Supervision and Resources

Green shows the activities of the European Union's Education, Audiovisual and Culture Executive Agency (EACEA). The head of the executive agency is Milvia Van Rij-Brizzi. Some of the managed/co-managed programs with DG EAC include:

⁃          Erasmus +

⁃          Creative Europe

⁃          Europe for Citizens

Yellow shows the activities the Research Executive Agency (REA). The structure has been established in Brussels in 2007 and since 2013, its activities are mostly linked to the management of various researches and innovation programs, such as the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions or Space Research. The REA reports its activities to 5 DGs, including the DG EAC.

Missions of the DG EAC

→ The framework for the DG EAC was fixed by the European Agenda for Culture, which aimed to strengthen the role and position of culture in a context of increasing globalization. In recent years, DG EAC has concentrated its activities on the implementation of the European agenda for culture, which was regularly reviewed to assess progress.

→ DG EAC operated mainly in the framework of:

The Culture Program (2007-2013), which supported the cultural diversity and heritage of Europe; and the MEDIA (2007-2013) and MEDIA Mundus programs (2011- 2013), which supported the audiovisual sector.

→ The framework of DG EAC's activities has changed with the implementation of the Creative Europe program for the years 2014-2020. This program brings a change of EU’s perspective of culture, with a significant investment in these sectors considered to have strong potential for innovation. The program reflects a change of EU’s direction, it is supposed to better answer to the structural changes brought by globalization and the transition to digital. With a budget of € 1.4 billion, its objective is to strengthen European cultural and artistic diversity and the competitiveness of the sectors concerned by 2020.

Axel Simon

Sources :

https://ec.europa.eu/programmes/horizon2020/en/what-horizon-2020

https://ec.europa.eu/programmes/horizon2020/en/what-horizon-2020

http://ec.europa.eu/dgs/education_culture/

http://ec.europa.eu/dgs/education_culture/docs/organisation_en.pdf

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4. What have been the main challenges facing the DG? Is it successful in meeting those challenges? 

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4. What have been the main challenges facing the DG? Is it successful in meeting those challenges? 

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→ The low investment of some states (in particular in southern and eastern Europe) in culture and education:

Supporting education and culture requires investments and sadly a number of member states have been investing less in these fields (across the EU, public investment in education has declined by 3.2% since 2010). However, in 2014, the EU helped to boost investment and making financial support available: through the € 315 billion Investment Plan that Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker presented to the European Parliament

→ Implementing the different programs (Erasmus+, Creative Europe) in all the countries: difficulties to synchronise all the systems but they succeeded

→ The weak communication and dissemination throughout Europe, and throughout the different institutions, which have been resolved

→ Difficulties to consult and to come to an agreement of all countries, especially since some countries are not members of the EU: full participation in Erasmus+ of Norway, Iceland, Liechtenstein, Macedonia and Turkey (administrational difficulties)

→ Difficulties to establish a common ground throughout Europe in order to adopt the proposed benchmark. Resolved with the agreement that it is necessary to improve the effectiveness of language and to assess progress through comparable testing methods at national level, providing results that can be aggregated at European level

→ The direct influence of the DG's actions on some of the impact indicators listed is often limited?

→ Over the last decade, as EAC policy areas have become increasingly important in the EU political agenda and as fund management has been further delegated to agencies, DG EAC's human resources profile has increasingly moved towards a policy and programme supervisory DG, rather than a direct programme implementing DG

Marie Le Carrer

Sources:

DG Education and Culture, Management Plan 2015 (European Commission), December 2014

Annual Activity Report 2014, DG Education and Culture, March 2015

Education and Training Monitor 2015, European Commission

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5. What problems have the DG needed to address? Successfully?

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5. What problems have the DG needed to address? Successfully?

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→ The differences (often the lack) of involvement and commitment depending on the states

→ Problem of spending cuts: in 2013, for the third consecutive year, the data shows an average decrease in education investment. Even if growth is slowly returning in Europe, Europe is not moving in the right direction fast enough: Educational poverty remains stubbornly embedded, with far too many disadvantaged students, and government investment – crucial to quality education – reveals worrying signs of spending cuts (from a demographic perspective, spending cuts in Slovenia, Italy, Ireland, the UK and Spain are the most problematic) (2015).

Solution: EU (and DG EAC) value-added manifests, firstly, in financial support, offered through the European Regional Development Fund, the European Social Fund and the new Investment Plan for Europe. Other value-added is founded through mutual learning and the strengthening of evidence-based policy making

→ Installation of Erasmus+ in 2014, much more slowly than planned. Due to the accumulation of tasks related to both management of previous programmes and new programmes, significant implementation delays were noticed in the middle of the year.

Problems with Swiss participation in Erasmus+ in 2014, because of the referendum “Against Mass Immigration” (because the Erasmus+ programme is closely linked to the free movement of persons. Has been solved since.

→ The last period (in the past 5 years) has also been marked by the consequences of the Ukrainian crisis for education and research activities. Following its illegal annexation by the Federation of Russia, the Commission has explored the possibility to exclude institutions located in Crimea from the ongoing Erasmus+ or Horizon 2020 calls. It has also suspended certain on-going projects in the areas of higher education and research in Crimea.

Solution to help stabilise the situation Ukraine: the EU has foreseen more opportunities to young Ukrainians under the new Erasmus+ programme (2014-2020). Lastly, as mentioned above, the participation of Ukraine to Creative Europe has been proposed

→ Problems of cooperation between OCDE and the DG EAC

→ Low rate of participation in Europe: Young people were less likely to trust institutions in 2011 than they did in 2007. In spite of efforts made by the DG EAC with young people, the youth participation in the latest European elections, which depends from many external factors, has remained disappointing

→ About the research: In contrast, international development has sometimes impeded the usual level of cooperation for the mobility of researchers with certain countries

→ Nowadays, the issue of the migrant crisis and the afflux of migrants all over Europe.

Marie Le Carrer

Sources:

DG Education and Culture, Management Plan 2015 (European Commission), December 2014

Annual Activity Report 2014, DG Education and Culture, March 2015

Education and Training Monitor 2015, European Commission

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6. Provide a case study of how the DG implements policy in the EU. What specific issues does it face?

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6. Provide a case study of how the DG implements policy in the EU. What specific issues does it face?

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Study on the Diversity within the Teaching Profession with Particular Focus on Migrant and/or Luxembourg: Publications Office of the European Union, 2016

This study focuses on the diversity of the teaching workforce with regard to migrant or/and minority background. Population becomes more and more multicultural and thus we need  diversity also in teaching workforce. In this study they have analysed the existing statistical data on the current situation, mapped the policies and effectiveness of the policies. This study was conducted with mixed methods: a literature review from international and European research, ten case studies, comparative analysis, expert seminars and a virtual Policy Delphi.

→ Conclusions:

1. Greater diversity among at the teaching staff at the pre-primary level.

2. A lot of barriers at different stages of teaching pathway from accessing and completing teaching profession.

3. Mainly considering migrant/minority population wanting to go to teaching professions:

Lower learning outcomes

Language barriers

Lack of financial recourses and social support

Lack of confidence and awareness

Negative or discriminatory experience

High level of competition

Complicated processes applying teacher profession

→ How to approach these barriers:

1. Encourage more migrant and minority pupils to start teacher education.

2. Supporting migrant students to finish their education

3. Helping migrant students to access the teaching profession

4. Supporting teaching staff with migrant students

→ Some recommendations for policy-makers/practitioners at Member State level

-  Support for migrant teachers on their studies and study pathway

-  More specific policies focusing on teacher training and teacher diversity

- Different approaches e.g. raising awareness, providing financial support, mentoring.

- Support for migrants outside EU

→ Recommendations for EU stakeholders

- Stakeholders like EU Commission have important role in raising awareness and advising good practices

- Encourage Member States with migrant and minority education.

- Key role in supporting intra EU labour mobility

- Recommendations for improving the evidence base

- More specific data collection in Member States

- Data collection should recognize  first and second/third generation migrants, migrants as opposed to national minorities, different minority groups and migrants from within the EU and from outside of the EU.

- More studies to improve knowledge about teacher diversity.

Riina Hänninen

Source:

Study on the Diversity within the Teaching Profession with Particular Focus on Migrant and/or Luxembourg: Publications Office of the European Union, 2016. Directorate-General for Education and Culture. Education and Training. Minority Background Final Report to DG Education and Culture of the European Commission.

http://ec.europa.eu/dgs/education_culture/repository/education/library/study/2016/teacher-diversity_en.pdf

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7. Provide a case-study of how the DG implements policy in Finland. What issues does it face?

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7. Provide a case-study of how the DG implements policy in Finland. What issues does it face?

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Education and Training Monitor 2016 Finland

→ Vision: Finland 2025 has six key knowledge and education projects identified by the Government. Aim is to invest 300 million euro is being invested in these six key goals.
→ Even if educational outcomes are some of the best in EU (among 15-year-old) they have been decreasing. But if you look at the key monitors we have still highest levels tertiary and higher education and also vocational and adults in lifelong learning in the EU (vocational or higher education one third of the students).

Challenges in Finnish education system:

→ Finland education budget has been stable, but declined in recent years.

→ Differences have been growing in educational outcomes and for example PISA results have been worsened and a skills gap of about two years for first-generation immigrants have widened.

→ Education of newly arrived migrant is a huge challenge in Finnish education system (because of the immigrant crisis).

Curricula has been modernised at all levels of education.

→ Comprehensive curriculum reform. → modernising the teaching and learning through new pedagogies and new learning environments.
→ Upper secondary education reform aims to achieve broad-based general knowledge and ability acquired through → lifelong learning → 21st century skills

VISION:FINLAND 2025

1. New learning environments and digital materials for basic education

2. Reform of vocational upper secondary education

3. Accelerated transition to working life in higher education

4. Access to art and culture for children and young people

5. Intensified cooperation between higher education and business life to commercialise innovations

6. Youth guarantee towards community guarantee

Riina Hänninen

Sources:

Education and Training Monitor 2016 Finland. Volume 2 of the Education and Training Monitor 2016.

https://ec.europa.eu/education/sites/education/files/monitor2016-fi_en.pdf

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8. What future work/challenges will the DG face in the future? 

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8. What future work/challenges will the DG face in the future? 

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Immigration

→ Migrants and the children of migrants often face disadvantages in their education, which can lead to them leaving school early and not complete higher education. Quite often, the school performances of the second generation migrants are worse than the school performances of the first generation migrants, which gives reason to believe that the social divide might increase. The disparities between the schools also increases.

→ Therefore, the DG needs to enable children of refugees and migrants to receive good education, to avoid segregation within schools and to establish equal opportunities for everyone, while protecting the growing linguistic and cultural diversity and building up intercultural abilities; adapting tuitional competences and building bridges to migrant families and societies.

→ Now, with the high numbers of refugees that entered the EU in the past years, this issue will be highly relevant in the future

Preservation of culture:

→ To ensure that culture plays a present and central role in Europe. For example, none of the five scenarios developed by Juncker concerning the EU for 27 mention culture. Therefore, Cristina Da Milano of Culture Action Europe (an association which aim is to promote culture in Europe) and Vice-Mayor of Rome and CAE former Secretary General Luca Bergamo talked about the importance of bringing cultural perspectives to the proposed scenarios and discussed the value of culture for human development, rather than economic development.

→ Due to Globalization, there will be the issue of protecting the different aspects of the European culture, also in the digital world. The European Commission wants to protect the “European cultural exception”.

For example, while Netflix has reduced the number of French films it proposes, a European Commission project wants to impose on audio-visual services (like Netflix), to better expose European work and to respect the production obligations fixed by the state where they broadcast their programs. In May 2016, the EC adopted the revision of the Audiovisual Media Services Directive of 2010, which contains two major contributions to video-on-demand operators such as Netflix or Amazon Prime Video:
- The respect of a quota of at least 20% of European works in their catalogue
- Respect of the quota of investment in European works normally planned in the country where these operators are received, even if they are established in another Member State of the European Union

Europe2020:

→ A strategy proposed by the European Commission in 2010 for an advancement of the economy of the European Union. Aims of this strategy also included a reduction of high school dropouts to under 10% and the increase of the part of the 30-34 year olds that have a completed tertiary education to at least 40 %. The DG of Education and Culture also has to face these aims.

Pauline Eicker

Sources:

http://ec.europa.eu/europe2020/europe-2020-in-a-nutshell/targets/index_de.htm

https://www.lesechos.fr/idees-debats/cercle/cercle-157420-la-commission-europeenne-et-lexception-culturelle-2002384.php

http://cultureactioneurope.org/news/wheres-culture-for-future-of-europe/

http://europa.eu/rapid/press-release_IP-08-1092_de.htm