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Have Polish, will travel

The effects of making work placements eligible for Erasmus grants.

Traditionally limited to periods of study at foreign universities, the EU’s Erasmus scheme was expanded to allow work-experience placements in 2007. The latest figures, released by the European Commission in June, show that the number of students seizing on the opportunity is growing rapidly.  

In 2008-09, 30,400 students took up Erasmus placements, up more than 50% on the previous year. Traditional study visits were made by 168,200 students, an increase of just 3.4%.

In many cases, the logic of a work-experience placement is easy to follow. Engineering students go to work in an engineering firm, or those studying travel and tourism work in foreign hotels. It is less easy to see why so many students are spending their overseas placements in the education sector.

Indeed, with 4,312 placements in 2008-09, education is the most popular sector, slightly ahead of placements in companies pursuing professional, scientific and technical activities. According to the Commission, this covers student teachers going to work in foreign schools. But that would mean that Erasmus is duplicating the work of the Comenius programme for schools.

Looking beneath the Erasmus figures reveals that these educational placements are playing a different role, providing teaching opportunities for students who are not specifically on teacher-training courses.

Problem-solving

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For example, the University of Wroclaw is sending students studying Polish abroad for experience teaching Polish as a foreign language. “It’s the perfect training for them,” says Alicja Meisel, who manages Erasmus placements at the university. Most go to universities in Latvia. “They teach Latvian students whose native language is not Polish, so they can already see what sort of problems they have to deal with in the future.”

While the opportunities for teaching Polish might seem limited, Meisel sees scope for more of these placements. “We have good collaborations across eastern Europe and we know that there are Polish-language institutes in universities, and also some smaller institutes, in western Europe,” she says. Some Wroclaw students have already had placements teaching Polish in Germany and France.

Until Erasmus opened up to placements, work experience was not usual for students at Wroclaw. “Our students really appreciate it,” Meisel says.

In contrast, work placements have long been a feature of degrees at the University of Limerick. Patrice Twomey, who manages the international side of its placement programme, can see why so many students are seeking teaching experience. “In the European context, humanities students are often the poor relations for work placements,” she says. “They don’t get the same chances as engineering and science students, or those on business studies.”

Limerick students taking up the opportunity tend to be those who have yet to settle on teaching as a career. “They are generally arts students who may have an interest in working as a teacher when they graduate, or maybe working in the broader area of education and training,” Twomey says.

Education placements are also open to a broader range of students. “Some of them might be students who don’t have a foreign language but who want to work abroad on the Erasmus scheme. English is their passport to that, working as English-language teachers.”

Transferable skills

Even if they do not have an eye on teaching as a career, the transferable skills they gain – from teamwork to communication – are highly valued on the graduate job market. “This placement is a formal element of their degree programme, and there are few academic modules that would contribute to skills development to the extent that a work placement does,” says Twomey.

Similar arguments are advanced in the UK, where Erasmus is used to fund placements for language students organised by the British Council. “It gives you professional work experience, and that’s extremely valuable on the job market,” says Howard White, director of studies at the University of Bath’s department of European studies and modern languages. “You develop all sorts of skills as a teacher that you wouldn’t necessarily develop under other circumstances.”

Ian Mundell is a freelance journalist based in Brussels.