How does your donation help?

The first year lays the foundations for a successful teaching career and supporting the development of students. It also has a big impact on the image of the profession: every new teacher’s career is closely watched by their family and friends, not to mention students. The succession of teachers is one of the great challenges of our education and society.

We want to take support for beginner teachers in Estonia to a new level, where they have access to the information they need to develop their knowledge, skills and activities, professional mentoring and the opportunity to meet other beginners. We do this in cooperation with partners, including school principals and school leaders, universities and policy-makers. We also contribute to the emergence of a professional community that supports the development of beginner teachers.

Why is it important? The teaching workforce in Estonia is ageing, many existing teachers are overworked and teacher shortages are one of the most acutely felt problems across the education landscape, which is directly affecting the quality of education for many students.

We have more than 1000 beginner teachers a year. However, we lose every fourth teacher before the second year. We also know that more than half of beginner teachers don’t have a teaching qualification. It is often rather random how the background of a beginner teacher is considered and how their tasks and support are planned. For the succession of teachers and for the benefit of students, it is essential that the start of every teacher’s career is systematically managed.

We need your support to develop the system.

Your donation will help us create the Beginner Teacher’s Guide: a virtual environment where we’ll bring together practical materials for beginner teachers to build on, to learn about teaching principles and practices in a conscious way and to develop their practices in parallel with their daily work. Alongside the e-platform, we also want to develop a variety of forms of learning based on direct interaction: seminars, workshops, supervision, mentoring, etc.

Our primary target is to raise €5000. We can say that every €100 allows us to add a new piece of material to the platform. With this amount, we aim to reach at least 10% of the beginner teachers in Estonia as early as the 2023/24 school year.

For more information see: alustavatopetajattoetavkool.ee

The organisation is included on the list of non-profit organisations eligible for income tax incentives. Read more about taxes here: Donations and taxes.