On 11 June, ISSA participated in theEuropean Commission’s Implementation Dialogue on Supporting the TeachingProfession in the EU, convened by Executive Vice-President Roxana Mînzatu inBrussels.
The Dialogue brought together a range of vices from across education, training, social partners, civil society and policy to reflect on how EU support for the teaching profession is working in practice, and how it can become simpler, more visible and more useful for teachers, school leaders, teacher educators and administrations. The invitationframed the discussion around two key questions: which EU initiatives have made the most tangible difference for teachers, and what major change would improveEU support for recruitment and retention.
For ISSA, the Dialogue was an important opportunity to bring one message clearly into the room: early childhood education and care professionals must be recognised as full members of the teaching profession.
Across Europe, the professionals who care for and educate the youngest children — in crèches, kindergartens and early childhood services — shape the foundations for everything that follows. The support children’s well-being, development, learning, relationships and senseof belonging during the years when the brain is developing most rapidly andinequalities can either narrow or deepen. Yet, for too long, they have remainedalmost invisible in European policy conversations on teachers, skills and the futureworkforce.
In her intervention, ISSA’s ProgramDirector Mihaela Ionescu acknowledged that important progress has been made.The European Commission Working Group on Early Childhood Education and Care helped place workforce issues such as recruitment, retention, professional development and recognition more firmly on the agenda. The European QualityFramework and the 2019 Council Recommendation established a shared vision of quality and recognised that a well-supported workforce is essential to achieving it. The Barcelona Targets and the European Care Strategy have helped drive investment in access and services, while Erasmus+ has supported learning, innovation and exchange among practitioners.
But ISSA also pointed to a persistent gap.Europe has rightly invested in expanding early childhood services and increasing access. However, this has not yet been matched by a comparableEuropean focus on the profession itself. At a time when many countries are facing workforce shortages, low status, difficult working conditions and retention challenges in early childhood education and care, this absence is becoming increasingly difficult to justify.
This concern is particularly relevant in the context of the Union of Skills, which aims to strengthen education, training and skills systems, support talent development and respond to Europe’s labour market and social needs. The Union of Skills also includes work towards an EU Teachers Agenda to improve working conditions, training and career prospects. Yet ECEC professionals remain insufficiently visible in this broader agenda.
This raises an important question forEurope’s next steps: if early childhood educators are not explicitly included in future teacher-support initiatives, how will the EU ensure that the workforce responsible for the earliest and most foundational years is not left behind?
ISSA’s message was that the EU does not need to replace national responsibilities in education. Workforce regulation, pay and professional standards remain national competences. But the EU has already shown, through the Barcelona Targets, the Quality Framework, ChildGuarantee, and other shared policy tools, that European priorities can influence national agendas and encourage convergence around quality, equity and investment. The same level of ambition is now needed for the early childhood workforce.
The change needed is clear: early childhood educators should be treated as full members of the teaching profession, with the status, preparation, pay, working conditions and professional development this implies. This is especially urgent for professionals working with children under three, who are often the least visible and least supported, despite working during one of the most critical periods of children’s development.
The newly published European Commission report The teaching profession in the EU highlights the importance of supportive working conditions for teacher satisfaction, well-being and retention. For ISSA, this finding must also be applied to early childhood education and care. If Europe is serious about strengthening the teaching profession, improving children’s learning and well-being, and building more inclusive societies, it cannot overlook those who work with children at the very beginning of life.
Investing in the early childhood workforce is not only an education priority. It is a social priority, an equity priority and an economic priority. It is also one of the clearest ways for Europe to acton what it already says it believes: that the early years matter.
ISSA will continue to advocate for ECEC professionals to be visible, valued and supported in European and national policy agendas. The next phase of EU action on teachers and skills should make this commitment explicit. Early childhood educators cannot remain at the margins of Europe’s teaching profession agenda. They must be at its foundation.
