Background 3: Qualifications of the respondents

The qualification of the respondents was probed by asking them to select from a list the type of qualification that best fitted them:

Your qualification:

language degree

teacher training

combination of language degree and teacher training

other qualification

Table BG-3a describes the qualifications of all European respondents (n=855) and Table BG-3b presents the same information for those of them who were, or had been language teachers (n=833).

Table BG-3a: Qualifications of all respondents working in Europe (n=855)

Regions of Europe		Qualification				Total
		language degree	teacher training	combination of language degree and teacher training	other qualifi-cation
Northern Europe	Count	45	27	186	14	272
	%	17	10	69	5%	100%
Baltic region	Count	22	8	18	6	54
	%	41	15	33%	11%	100%
Western Europe	Count	27	21	88	22	158
	%	17%	13%	56%	14	100%
Central Europe	Count	9	9	35	11	64
	%	14%	14%	55	17%	100%
South-Eastern Europe	Count	39	11	69	14	133
	%	29%	8%	52	11	100%
Eastern Europe	Count	29	9	65	17	120
	%	24%	8	54%	14%	100%
Southern Europe	Count	13	5	23	13	54
	%	24%	9%	43	24%	100%
	Total Count	184	90	484	97	855
	Total %	22	11	57	11%	100%

Table BG-3b: Qualification of respondents working in Europe who taught or had taught a language (n = 833)

Regions of Europe		Qualification				Total
		language degree	teacher training	combination of language degree and teacher training	other qualifi-cation
Northern Europe	Count	44	25	186	12	267
	%	17	9%	70	5	100%
Baltic region	Count	22	8	18	6	54
	%	41	15	33%	11%	100%
Western Europe	Count	24	21	88	21	154
	%	16	14	57%	14	100%
Central Europe	Count	9	9	35	10	63
	%	14%	14%	56	16	100%
South-Eastern Europe	Count	39	11	68	14	132
	%	30	8%	52	11	100%
Eastern Europe	Count	28	9	64	13	114
	%	25	8	56%	11%	100%
Southern Europe	Count	11	4	23	11	49
	%	22%	8%	47	22%	100%
	Total Count	177	87	482	87	833
	Total %	21%	10%	58	10%	100%

On average, more than half of the respondents were fully qualified to teach languages in the sense that they had both a language degree and that they had teacher training. On the other hand, this also means that almost half of them were only partially qualified for language teaching as far as formal qualifications are concerned. One fifth (21%) had a language degree only and about 10% had either only teacher training (without a language degree) or some other type of qualification.

Some regional differences can be seen in the data. Whether they reflect a more general state of affairs in the regions or individual countries is hard to say since the survey is not based on a truly representative sample. Such generalisations would require comparison of our results with e.g. official statistics about acting teachers’ qualifications in different countries.

In this survey, the best qualified language teachers came from Northern Europe where 70% had both a language degree and teacher training. In Eastern, Western, South-Eastern and Central Europe over half were fully qualified, closely followed by Southern Europe. Only in the Baltic countries did only a third of the respondents have full formal qualification to teach.

The number of teachers who taught without either a language degree or teachers training was not very big (about 10% of the respondents who were teachers), which makes it tentative at best to say whether teaching without formal qualifications is more common in certain regions. In our data, that was rare in Northern European countries but somewhat more common in Southern and Central Europe in particular.

Table BG-3c qualifications by the country: Crosstabulation by the countries with the biggest response rates

(Only those included who reported teaching or having taught a language)

Country		Qualification				Total
		language degree	teacher training	combination of lg degree and teacher training	other qualifi-cation
Belgium	Count	2	1	15	3	21
	%	10%	5%	71%	14%	100%
Bulgaria	Count	8	2	16	3	29
	%	28%	7%	55%	10%	100%
Estonia	Count	10	8	10	5	33
	%	30%	24%	30%	15%	100%
Finland	Count	27	12	124	8	171
	%	16%	7%	73%	5%	100%
Greece	Count	10	3	27	4	44
	%	23%	7%	61%	9%	100%
Hungary	Count	3	4	18	2	27
	%	11%	15%	67%	7%	100%
Ireland	Count	2	2	14	5	23
	%	9%	9%	61%	22%	100%
Netherlands	Count	8	3	20	2	33
	%	24%	9%	61%	6%	100%
Norway	Count	4	4	13	2	23
	%	17%	17%	57%	9%	100%
Poland	Count	5	5	18	4	32
	%	16%	16%	56%	13%	100%
Romania	Count	17	2	25	5	49
	%	35%	4%	51%	10%	100%
Slovenia	Count	15	4	24	3	46
	%	33%	9%	52%	7%	100%
Spain	Count	9	4	16	6	35
	%	26%	11%	46%	17%	100%
Sweden	Count	13	8	48	2	71
	%	18%	11%	68%	3%	100%
Turkey	Count	13	3	14	7	37
	%	35%	8%	38%	19%	100%
United Kingdom	Count	9	15	38	11	73
	%	12%	21%	52%	15%	100%
Other European countries	Count	22	7	44	15	88
	%	25%	8%	50%	17%	100%
Non-European countries	Count	8	8	27	4	47
	%	17%	17%	58%	9%	100%
Totals	Count	185	95	511	91	882
Totals	%	21%	11%	58%	10%	100.0%

Of the countries with more than 20 respondents, the best qualified teachers in this survey were from Belgium, Finland, Hungary and Sweden where at least two thirds (66% or more) of the teachers had both a language degree and teacher training. Also in Ireland and Greece more than 60% had that combined qualification.

Less than half of the respondents working in Estonia, Turkey and Spain had the combined language teaching qualifications. Ireland, Estonia, Turkey, Spain and the UK were countries where at least 15% of the teachers surveyed here reported having neither a language degree nor teacher training. Since the absolute number of such respondents per country is quite small, this finding is suggestive at best.