Evaluating the Impact of Virtual Exchange on Initial Teacher Education: A European Policy Experiment

Students of initial teacher education need to be prepared for the classrooms of tomorrow. Teachers require the necessary skills and competences to teach in culturally diverse contexts, to collaborate across disciplines, and to use technologies in innovative ways; but the Digital Economy and Society Index reports that only 20-25% of students in Europe are taught by teachers who are confident using technology in the classroom, and only a small number of students of education are gaining intercultural experience by participating in international mobility programmes such as Erasmus+ (European Commission, 2015a). It is clear that institutions of initial teacher education need to find new ways to prepare their students for the challenges they will meet in the future. This report presents the findings of our study. However, not only do we provide here a large-scale study to demonstrate the impact of virtual exchange in an important field of university education, we also explore how policy makers and university management can take actions to make this methodology more widespread across university education and support students and teachers in its use. [To view the executive summary, "Executive Summary -- The Key Findings from The EVALUATE European Policy Experiment Project on The Impact of Virtual Exchange on Initial Teacher Education," see ED593745.]