2005:17 R

Evaluation of the new teacher-training programmes at higher education institutions.

This report presents the findings of an evaluation of the new teacher-training programmes and the follow-up of the reform in teacher training conducted by the National Agency for Higher Education in 2004. This was undertaken as part the task assigned to the Agency of evaluating all programmes in higher education during a six-year period.

This task was entrusted to a panel of external assessors with experts from Sweden and the Nordic countries, representatives of the labour market and teacher-trainee students. The report consists of three sections.

Section 1: Follow-up of the reform and quality evaluation contains the decisions and reflections of the National Agency for Higher Education as well as the panel´s report.

The panel´s report begins with a summary of the background to and establishment of the new teacher training system and the task assigned to the National Agency together with the way in which the panel conducted the evaluation and the extent of the teacher training programmes at the higher education institutions. The panel finds that the ways in which the institutions have interpreted the reform have resulted in the creation of programmes with varying structures and varying contents.

The panel goes on to discuss quality and the conditions that govern quality in programmes. They point out in the section on teacher resources, teacher qualifications and skills enhancement that the majority of those teaching, supervising and examining students are lecturers who, as a rule, have no research training themselves. It is extremely rare to find teachers with the most advanced academic qualifications, such as professors, involved in teacher-training programmes. In addition, the new teacher training programmes allow students a great deal of freedom in planning their own course of study and they themselves are responsible for their own development, which requires a great deal of them.

Links with research and fundamental academic principles, progressivity, standards demanded and responsibility for professional improvement, the attainment of goals, quality assurance by means of monitoring and evaluation and also student participation and involvement are also dealt with. The panel finishes its report by summing up its conclusions in recommendations to the National Agency for Higher Education and the institutions.

The National Agency´s reflections begin with an overall judgement, recommendations to the government and the institutions, together with the measures it intends to adopt within the next year. The areas which the Agency has chosen to reflect on specifically are the premises on which the reform was based and its implementation along with various elements in teacher training, i.e. shared areas and specialisations, placements, the situation of the students, links with research, the special teacher training boards and adaptation to the Bologna Process.

The National Agency´s decision, on the basis of the evaluation, is to follow up the recommendations made to the institutions by the panel and the agency in a new evaluation in two years. In addition, its decision means that within one year as part of its supervisory role the Agency will review the responsibilities and powers of the special boards; how the institutions guarantee that programmes deal with central areas of knowledge required by all teachers, such as the development of reading and writing skills, testing, grading, assessment and evaluation; examine a random sample of degree projects to review their quality; and also conduct a special study of the forms of examination used in teacher training programmes.

Section 2: Description and evaluation of the individual institutions describes the situation in teacher training programmes at the universities of Uppsala, Lund, Göteborg, Umeå, Linköping, Karlstad, Växjö and Örebro, the Luleå University of Technology, the university colleges of Borås, Dalarna, Gävle, Halmstad, Jönköping, Kalmar, Kristianstad, Trollhättan/Uddevalla, Malmö, Mälardalen and Södertörn, the Stockholm University College of Physical Education and Sports, the University College of Arts, Crafts and Design, the Royal University College of Music in Stockholm, the Stockholm Institute of Education and the Mid-Sweden University College, during the spring and autumn of 2004 and their staffing situation during 2003. The panel of assessors reports its impressions after reviewing the self-evaluations and their appendices, examining the results of the special studies undertaken in connection with the evaluation and site visits lasting one day. Each description and evaluation concludes with a number of recommendations to the institution.

Section 3: Specific studies accounts for four of the studies conducted by the National Agency in connection with this evaluation and which were included in the material on which the panel of assessors based its descriptions and assessments in sections 1 and 2.