“Education is not filling of a pail, but the lightning of a fire”
William Butler Yeats
Modernisation of the system of education constitutes a precondition for its efficiency. Systemic analyses indicate that a system can be considered efficient only if it manages to successfully adapt to different conditions under which it is expected to function. Schools as socially organised institutions need to keep up with changes if they wish to be successful in their mission of preparing young people for the life and endeavour in the 21st century. Therefore, the education of prospective pre-school teachers at our College entails preparation for the future by means of educating competent pre-school teachers ready to respond to the forthcoming challenges. The ability to adjust is indubitably very important. However, what is even more important is the ability to perceive flaws in a system and the courage to grapple with those disadvantages and shortcomings. Our institution encourages and enables young people to discern children´s needs and adjust their actions accordingly so that they could prepare both children and themselves for a life in which learning is a lifelong process, and not a dump substance enclosed within the walls of educational institutions.
Through different historical periods and circumstances of life schools became detached from real life and found themselves stranded on their own islands ruled by information, data and statistics which are kept and used like museum exhibits, without a real desire to enable one to apply the acquired knowledge in order to ameliorate the human condition. The mission of our College is to reattach life and science by educating young people and raising awareness that education needs to be understood as a tool for improving the quality of life, not as a piece of paper quite often erroneously paralleled with the notion of competences guaranteed by it.
Aside from preparing young people for future challenges, it is necessary to encourage the College staff to permanent improvement. Only those who fully comprehend the needs of the times and who are prepared to change themselves for the better can be allowed to accept the responsibility for educating young generations. Professional improvement is implied in regard to the College staff. However, for the purposes of the prospective co-operation with colleges around Europe and the world, the College staff members also improve their language, communication and cultural competences.
Our College is proud of its openness, i.e. readiness to change in line with the needs of the times. As a result, we educate flexible pre-school teachers who will not falter at the prospect of changes, but who will be the harbingers of innovation and progress, depending on the moment and the needs, as well as on their own perceptions and experiences.
In order to primarily create quality and then to secure its sustainability the College takes permanent care of self-evaluation and of the changes in the quality of education. Everyone is a part of the self-evaluation process: those who directly participate in the teaching process, as well as those whose task it is to secure elementary conditions necessary for the unhindered teaching process Hence, the process of self-evaluation encompasses students, teaching staff, non-teaching staff, the College management.