A varied summer...

Last weekend we said goodbye to the last of our ‘summer visitors’, a great group of colleagues from vocational schools and colleges in Berlin, Lower Saxony and Baden-Württemberg. During the week they were with us we of course discussed the teaching of English in vocational settings, but we were all also able to benefit from the hospitality offered by colleagues from Edinburgh College, Skills Development Scotland and the Recruitment and Skills Centre at Fort Kinnaird. 

On the terrace of Edinburgh College's eh15 restaurant before another delicious lunch prepared by the students. 

The great thing about our job is that no two weeks are the same – whether it is working with our regular business clients who are living here in Scotland, or receiving visitors from all over the EU – the variety keeps us stimulated and on our toes. The gloom of Brexit apart, here is a selection of positive EU-funded events this year:

Colleagues from Germany, Finland, Spain and Croatia attended our course for vocational teachers in March and July, and primary & secondary teachers from Germany, France, Portugal, Iceland & Slovenia were with us for our summer immersion course for teachers of general English.

A group of lively trainee primary teachers from the training college in Laupheim, Germany were here in June and once more we offer huge thanks to the schools who hosted them on placement, this time St Mary’s RC Primary in Leith, and the Burgh and Whitecraig primary schools in Musselburgh.

Along with our colleagues from LFEE, we hosted a huge crowd – 56 of them! – of primary and vocational teachers from Montpellier in France for a 10 day training course in July.  And we must have done something right as we’re pleased to say they are returning next year!   They were up for everything –

And we are delighted that ongoing vocational exchange projects are continuing with the Alice-Salamon-Berufskolleg in Bochum and the Bergiusschule in Frankfurt.  Once again we greatly appreciate Edinburgh College’s involvement here.  We are also happy to be continuing our longstanding collaboration with the City of Munich – we are looking forward to welcoming 12 more colleagues from the world of Early Education at the end of this month.

None of this would happen without EU funding… we're just taking every month as it comes ...