IPA training offer

Parents International’s training offer primarily build on the training needs of professional identified when focusing on topics and gaps that are important for parents as the responsible people for the education of their children. Most parents wish to use the services schools can offer to partially cover their obligation to educate their children, but parents would also like to see changes that would reassure them that school is a good place for their kids. Thus, we are primarily offering trainings for education professionals, but also for parent leaders that can help them engage all their peers and help their children to also be engaged in schooling provisions and their organisation.

For specific enquiries about our training offer, please contact us at [email protected]

Training for Teachers

Our trainings are generally designed to be 3-5 full days, tailored to the needs of the participants. We offer these trainings in international settings, eligible for Erasmus+ mobility funding, but also offer them in local settings if you have the funding to hold them. Most of the trainings can also be organised in a shorter format, a kind of teaser with a duration ranging from a few hours to one full day.

Depending on the continuous professional development requirements in your country, the trainings can be recognised as teachers’ compulsory CPD. To complement shorter trainings, we also offer some parts of them in a self-paced online format that participants receive a microcredential certificate for upon completion. We offer the trainings primarily in English, but also in Hungarian and Italian. Other languages are also possible but subject to negotiations.

Inclusion in school and Universal Design for Learning

Inclusion in education has been a hot topic, but also a major challenge in schools all over the world. There is a growing diversity of students in classrooms, and also there is an increasing demand for school provisions that are reflective of the special education needs of each student. Our school inclusion course, building on the Universal Design for Learning principles, supports teachers to become learning facilitators who can cater for these diverse needs.

Student-centred teaching methods

The increasing demand for moving away from traditional teaching methods in our rapidly changing world makes it necessary for teachers to familiarize themselves with various methods that build on students’ learning needs. While project-based learning has become widely used, other methods are often not known or used less. This course offers teacher first to experience, then to learn how to implement methods such as playful learning, inquiry–based learning, problem-based learning, game-based learning and gamification.

Parental engagement and student participation

When teachers are asked about the main challenges in their daily work, working with parents is always at the top of the list. Similarly, teacher and school leaders often struggle to engage students in school life and decision-making. This course, building on recent research-based frameworks, offers teachers an opportunity to reflect on their potential barriers to engaging with all parents and students, especially the ones coming very different from them. During the course, teachers will be guided to develop their own strategies for the engagement of parents and students.

Better engagement of migrant families in school

A growing number of migrant students often pose challenges when it comes to schooling. This course, building on the Funds of Knowledge principles, offers guidance to teachers and school leaders on engaging migrant families better in school life. This training offers a solution to the gap in training on both family engagement and working with culturally diverse groups.

Trauma-informed approaches in education

Recent global events and processes, such as the war in the Ukraine or the Middle East or climate change have brought the notion of trauma to the forefront. We also know that the Covid-related fearmongering left many children traumatised. It is a lesser know fact, that many behavioural challenges and learning difficulties are also results of trauma that happened at various stages of a child’s development. This course, building on the work of Bruce D. Perry and Bessel van Der Kolk, supports teachers to move away from reactive actions and have trauma-informed tools to tackle their students’ traumas.

Entrepreneurial teaching and learning

There is a growing demand for teachers to be entrepreneurial in their teaching and offer innovative, entrepreneurial learning opportunities for their students. At the same time, we know from research that teacher tend to be less entrepreneurial than the general population. This course, building on the entrepreneurial skills identified in the EntreComp, helps teacher to develop their own entrepreneurial skills (without any business or for-profit goals) that can help them in being entrepreneurial in their teaching and offer similar opportunities to their students in a rapidly changing school reality.

Teachers as active citizen role models

Active citizenship education is one of the main goals of schooling. There are ample resources available for teachers to be used in the classroom to develop their students’ skills and competences in this field. However, recent research shows that teachers, especially if they want to educate by role modelling, need to develop their skills in this field. This course offers participants an opportunity to become more critical thinkers, resilient and creative role models, people in the life of their students who can navigate public life well and support them by being an example and a leader.

Mitigating risks and building resilience in the digital world

As the use of digital devices and tools are becoming a daily reality in school life, and the digital world has become an inseparable part of the life of children, it is important to start properly integrating them in daily education. For a long time, trainings and tools were mainly focusing on “protecting” children, but it is now time to accept that digitalisation and the risks accompanying it are part of life. This course offers teachers and school leaders methods and strategies to build the resilience of their students in this new reality. It is also aiming at supporting education professionals to become more competent digital sailors themselves, for example in understanding and embracing social media or AI.

Supporting the inclusion of disabled students

Within the realm of inclusion, special focus has been on the inclusion of students with disabilities. This course focuses specifically on the needs of students with intellectual disabilities – that is often accompanied by physical ones. It builds on the assets these students have an offers an approach that supports them in becoming as independent as possible. Parents of these children are even more important to engage than parents of students without disabilities, so the course also highlights practices to properly engage their families while keeping the necessary boundaries.

For school leaders

The whole school approach and shared leadership

The whole school approach and open schooling have been identified as the best tools for a number of challenges school leaders face nowadays. It is a necessary element of inclusion strategies that cater for individual student needs. UNESCO identified them as the best approach to education for sustainable development. At the same time, the necessary internal partnerships, the engagement of parents, students and teachers in decision-making also helps counter the growing disillusionment in school and major movements to abandon traditional schooling. This course offers school leaders with tools to make these a reality and helps them to develop their own, local strategies.

Well-being at school

This course supports school leaders to develop strategies and methods to increase the well-being of their staff as well as their students. This topic has become very focal in the work of leaders. From organising work in a way that prioritises well-being to catering for individual challenges to mental and physical health. Teacher burnout is a major driver for teachers to leave the profession and the growing teacher shortage is posing additional challenges to well-being. By taking this course, school leaders will get support to break vicious cycles and become able to provide an environment that is better for both students and staff.

For parents

We are offering online trainings available for parents of children with disabilities (ELPIDA, PAT) and on entrepreneurial parenting.

We also have an in-person training offer for parents and parent leaders. They are always tailored to local needs and realities, and they are offered to be held locally. There are three main topics we offer trainings in:

Advocacy training on better and meaningful engagement

One of the main advocacy topics for parent organisations has been meaningful engagement. This course explores opportunities and inspiring practices in becoming fully engaged is school life, democratic and equal representation of diverse parent communities and methods to ensure the best possible preparation of parent leaders who are not only equal partners of any teacher or school leader, but also perceived as ones.

Supporting the engagement of all parents in school life

Parents with an established good relationship can support both schools and families in better communication and engagement for all. This course offers the award-winning Parent’R’Us coaching and mentoring methodology for this. The basis of the training is a framework in which parents with better engagement success mentor their peers and also mentor and coach teachers. This methodology has been chosen as one of the 12 most innovative and scalable parental engagement programmes globally.

Entrepreneurial parenting

Entrepreneurial thinking and acting is a crucial part of life in today’s society. This training is building on the research preceding the development of the ParENTrepreneurs training that is largely online, and help parents and parent leaders to become more entrepreneurial while also creating opportunities for their children to develop their entrepreneurial skills. The training is beneficial for all parents, but it can also specifically support parents who want to become more self-reliant and able to cater for the needs of their children by enabling them to use the skills and competences gained in this training in their daily life including its professional part.