The Outstanding New Teacher programme (ONTP) Erasmus Project

Project Title

The Outstanding New Teacher programme (ONTP)

Project Key Action

This project related with these key action: Cooperation for innovation and the exchange of good practices

Project Action Type

This project related with this action type : Strategic Partnerships for school education

Project Call Year

This project’s Call Year is 2014

Project Topics

This project is related with these Project Topics: Research and innovation; Quality Improvement Institutions and/or methods (incl. school development); Pedagogy and didactics

Project Summary

The project ONTP, outstanding newly qualified teacher programme, focused on the support of starting teachers during the first years of their careers. This support must be seen as a shared interest for the school (the workplace), the teacher training school, pedagogical guidance service and other external partners to work together intensively and complementary. Therefore the partners of the project developed and exchanged tools for three target groups, namely:
• School leaders
• Mentors/coaches
• Starting teachers
The expected results of this project on longer term were:
• increased confidence of teachers
• effective support to newly qualified teachers
• new teachers delivering high quality lessons
• the (further) development of a learning culture within the school,
• higher retention rates of teachers
• learners in the care of new teachers will make more progress
At the start of the project (projectmeeting 1), all partners exchanged information and insight on the different models of induction in the partner countries. The purpose of the project was never to select one effective system but to develop several support measures and tools for school leaders and teachers so they can develop their own coherent system in the school, embedded in the existing structure and culture. During the course of the project all partners agreed upon developing next to tools for teachers and school leaders, tools for mentors and coaches. The development of the tools for teachers was based on three dimensions: the professional (teacher competences and skills), the social (becoming a member of the school and professional community) and the personal (professional identity/profile). The last two have not often been subject for research. Critical success factors for the development of the tools were indicated and roles of stakeholders were defined.
All partners were and still are very much committed to invest in the well-being and professional development of all teachers during the course of their career.
As a direct target group we wanted to reach pre-service teachers, newly qualified teachers, teachers and school leaders. School leaders play a key role in the professionalization policy of the school. The indirect target group, is the final and most important one, namely the students. Why did we want to do this project? Because we want to offer quality education to all students by offering tools for teacher training schools and other pedagogical guidance services to support starting teachers, mentors and school leaders.
The cooperation in this partnership between schools, teacher training schools/universities and pedagogical guidance services was unique. The partners in this project had their own expertise and were:
– POV, a pedagogical guidance service for 60 schools
– CLV, Cramlington Learning Village, a secondary school licensed to train 40 teachers a year (and guiding another 20 schools),
– Het Perspectief, a teacher training school in Belgium
– The Institute of Education of the University of Lisbon
– The University of Finland with sufficient and thorough research experience on teacher training, Professor Hannele Niemi
The project consisted of 3 phases spread over three school years.
Year 1 was the conceptualization and development phase. Each partner committed to develop the concept and the tools described in application form and used a memorandum of understanding to monitor the engagements. A vision on how the partners saw the project was written out in a manifest. The results, information, research and documents were discussed during the project meetings. The partners also wrote a policy document for school leaders and discussed the setting up of the website and developed a logo for the project.
Year 2 was used to develop and test the tools and do the research. Based on the feedback of the project meetings, the developed tools were further adjusted as well as the quality instruments to measure the results. The partners tested the tools in their own network. In this year we set up a website www.ontp.org to assemble all the outputs created (research results, tools, manifest…). In year two, 2 partners (Finland and Belgium) engaged in participating in the TEPE conference in Malta. Year 3 was the multiplication year. 3 international multiplier events took place. The first and the last event were meant for school leaders, policy makers and university partners. The target group of the second multiplier event were starting teachers. During this last year of the project, policy recommendations were written and presented at the multiplier event in Portugal. The project aimed at being sustainable and will continue to maintain the website for the next 6 years (www.ontp.org). By using the developed tools and manifest in our daily work, as well as disseminating the project during the multiplier events, we can state that we worked all together to reach the impact we aimed for.

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 230787,59 Eur

Project Coordinator

Provinciaal Onderwijs Vlaanderen Pedagogische Ondersteuning & Country: BE

Project Partners

• Het Perspectief Provinciaal Centrum voor Volwassenenonderwijs
• HELSINGIN YLIOPISTO
• UNIVERSIDADE DE LISBOA
• Cramlington Learning Village