In this blog, I would like to draw your attention to a major leap forward in the Agency’s data collection activities in the area of inclusive education. The Agency has been involved in data collection throughout the past two decades. We first collected comparative quantitative data on the numbers of pupils identified as having special educational needs (SEN) in Agency member countries in 1999. Data collection activities were then reviewed and data has been systematically collected every two years since 2002.

In my last message of this year, I am pleased to inform you that Bulgaria will become a member of the Agency as of January next year!

Inclusion is high on the agenda in Bulgaria. In December, the Agency took part in the 2016 Annual Inclusive Education Conference, organised by the Centre for Inclusive Education, Bulgaria, in partnership with UNICEF Bulgaria. I gave a keynote speech about inclusion in Europe and the European Union’s objectives for inclusive education. Another Agency colleague presented the outcomes of our Teacher Education for Inclusion project.

On 16 November, the Agency participated in a seminar discussing how policies and technology support inclusive education. This event took place in the European Parliament and was organised by Ádám Kósa MEP, in co-operation with Helga Stevens MEP, Silvia Costa MEP and the Agency.

In 2015 we undertook a new type of partnership for the Agency – we entered into a formal agreement with a publishing house - the Emerald Publishing Group – to write a book for commercial publication. The Agency has contributed in different ways to published books and journals in the past, but we have never entered into a formal agreement to produce work for another organisation before.

The Agency’s 29 member countries cover most of the European continent, and they all have widely different policies regarding inclusive education, based on their different historical and political backgrounds. Despite their differences, I am extremely pleased that our member countries have now agreed a 'focal point' for the work of the Agency in the form of a shared ultimate vision for inclusive education systems!

The Luxembourg Recommendations from the young people are now online

On 16 October 2015 the Agency organised a Hearing in Luxembourg, where participants discussed how their schools and communities ensure an inclusive education for them. The outcomes of this event echo the outcomes of the three previous European Hearings we held in Brussels (2003 and 2011) and in Lisbon (2007). I am pleased to say that each of the outcomes reflects an increasing and visible progress in the implementation of inclusive education in European countries since 2003.

On 17 and 18 June I joined the important Agency project kick-off meeting on Raising the Achievement of All Learners in Inclusive Education in Athens as an event within the framework of the Greek Presidency. The participants were school leaders and researchers from our member countries and they discussed the content and design of the 3-year project that focuses on bringing together these two communities who are usually not in direct contact.

I am happy to announce that Croatia has become an observer country of the Agency in 2014. We warmly welcome Croatia into our organisation and look forward to working with Croatia when it becomes the Agency’s 29th member country in the near future.

This is a new Agency platform where I will be sharing with you content updates and developments relating to the Agency activities.

After 18 years of operation, a major change took place in January 2014: the Agency’s name was changed to ‘European Agency for Special Needs and Inclusive Education’. The concept ‘inclusive’ is now used in our organisation’s name, to better represent the focus of our work, aiming to support the implementation of European and international policies for inclusive education.