During their week in Seville in January/February 2016, 15 Polish VET teachers visited five vocational schools to compare their school systems and look for techniques to implement in their own center.

Some of their opinions:

‘In our opinion it is great idea to apply a lot of hours of practical training and education that allows better preparation of students for their future professional career.’

‘We also support the idea of “closed school” – all classes and extracurricular activities take place at school, including breaks. This way of organizing functioning of the institution allows teacher to take care and control students more effectively.’

‘As far as the school personnel is concerned, we find teachers well prepared to work and communicate with students.’

Overall, the teachers were very happy with their visits and wrote down plenty of good ideas seen in Spain they would like to use in their own center. Furthermore, their belief in their own center rose too and they are more ready than ever to take the education they offer to a higher level:

‘After the visit we got confidence that the programmes offered by our institute are adequate for students and provide them with skills and knowledge that open a wide spectrum of professional development and career opportunities.’

‘We also noticed that the level of English and other foreign languages is very low in Spain. Therefore, we will try to use this opportunity and advantage that our students have and encourage them to compete more on the European market and start searching job opportunities outside of Poland.’