On January 25, Teach For Bulgaria’s Founder and CEO Evgenia Peeva-Kirova participated in the first European Education Summit organized by the European Commission. The Summit, which gathered 20 European Ministers of Education and stakeholders and business leaders working in the education sector across European Union Member States, aimed to explore and generate discussions around the future of education on the continent. It also laid down the foundations of the European Education Area by 2025, adopted in November 2017, with a focus on innovation, inclusion, and value-based education.

Evgenia participated in the panel “Excellence, autonomy and recognition, is that what teachers need?” where she shared the preliminary positive results of the project A New Way for New Talents in Teaching (NEWTT). A program of the EU’s Erasmus+ initiative that supports education, training, youth, and sport, NEWTT is a consortium led by Teach For Bulgaria of Teach For All partners in Austria, Latvia, Romania, and Spain, as well as the network’s global organization, that is piloting and testing alternative pathways into teaching. In her remarks, Evgenia demonstrated the effectiveness of the Teach For All network’s shared approach in bringing into classrooms successful and highly-motivated leaders who are having a positive impact on their students, schools, and education systems.

“The Teach For All NEWTT pilot shows that NEWTT trainees are more motivated to work as teachers for social change purposes instead of job security,” Evgenia shared. These leaders, she explained, “prepare our kids to live in dignity and contribute as active citizens.”

At the Summit, the European Commission and the Ministers of Education voiced a strong commitment to pursuing and promoting innovations that would lead to systemic impact across the EU and increase the exchange of knowledge and learning among teachers, school leaders, and other education sector stakeholders. “After years of crisis, education is back where it belongs: on top of the European agenda,” said EU Commissioner for Education, Culture, Youth and Sport, Tibor Navracsics. In a time of turbulence and uncertainty in Europe, he also noted that "no one should underestimate the power of education to foster social cohesion.”

In his keynote address, the Bulgarian Minister of Education and Science Krasimir Valchev highlighted the relevance of projects like NEWTT in deepening European cooperation. “We need to work together towards a more united Europe and foster a stronger Erasmus+ programme post 2020,” when the initiative ends.

Learn more about the Erasmus+ NEWTT project.