“The genius of the Greeks” (July 5) unjustly discredits the reputation of the European Schools.
As secretary-general of the European Schools, and on behalf of the European Schools System, I am keen to distance myself from this publication as, in my opinion, it unjustly discredits our schools’ reputation
First of all, I consider it highly regrettable that this article disparages the professionalism of our Greek teachers and the commitment of their students.
It is unfortunate that some very general and commonplace statements made by officials of the schools are quoted out of context in order to support a view that the European Schools Community in general does not share.
The author’s suggestion that the European Schools would tolerate an unfair treatment among students is misleading.
On the contrary, the European Schools has in place a quality assurance system under the responsibility of national inspectors to ensure the validity, reliability and transparency of our teaching and assessment. The national inspectors guarantee the level and quality of the European Baccalaureate examinations, as well as respect for regulations in each examination center.
The Baccalaureate examinations are governed by the harmonized rules found in our regulations. Each Baccalaureate session is overseen and supervised each year by a chairman of the European Baccalaureate, who is a national independent expert (very often a university professor) proposed by the country holding the annual presidency of the European Schools’ board of governors.
The article claims that subject coordinators are only now being recruited, although this system has in fact been in place since the origins of the European Schools, and efforts are constantly made to improve it.
The professional training offered to the teachers in our schools is updated and reviewed every year. All teachers and other staff members are also reminded annually of ethics and integrity rules.
Finally, as secretary-general, I would like to insist that the opinion expressed in the article is based on very few sources and partly on rumors, and is not confirmed by the long-term data on success rates, which is freely available on the website of the office of the secretary-general.
Giancarlo Marcheggiano
Secretary-General, European Schools
Brussels, Belgium