European Parliament resolution on the Commission communications on the initiative and the action plan for 2001-2004 entitled ‘e-Learning – Designing tomorrow's education’ (COM(2000) 318 — C5-0741/2000 and COM(2001) 172 — C5-0151/2001 — 2000/2337(COS))
Date: 2001-05-15
Institutions: Committee on Culture and Education, European Parliament
Subjects: EU initiative, access to education, education, educational institution, information technology, new technology, organisation of teaching, vocational training

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Calls on the Commission to include in any future White Paper a clear timetable for a report to the

29.
budgetary authority on its implementation, and to respect this timetable;

30.
Calls on the Commission in any future report on the implementation of a White Paper to evaluate
the success or failure of the actions and measures it has taken and an assessment of whether these have
been good value for money;

Calls on the Commission to present any such report in clear and plain language and to make an

31.
effort to organize any such report in such a way that it is easy to understand;

Instructs its President to forward this resolution to the Commission, the Council and the govern-

32.
ments of the Member States.

18. e-Learning (cid:129) Designing tomorrow(cid:146)s education

A5-0152/2001

European Parliament resolution on the Commission communications on the initiative and the
education(cid:146)
action plan for

(cid:145)e-Learning (cid:129) Designing

tomorrow(cid:146)s

2001-2004

entitled

(COM(2000) 318 (cid:129) C5-0741/2000 and COM(2001) 172 (cid:129) C5-0151/2001 (cid:129) 2000/2337(COS))

The European Parliament,

(cid:129) having regard to the Commission communication (COM(2000) 318 (cid:129) C5-0741/2000)

(cid:129) having regard to the Commission communication (COM(2001) 172 (cid:129) C5-0151/2001),

(cid:129) having regard to Articles 149, 150 and 157 of the EC Treaty,

(cid:129) having regard to the report from the Commission entitled (cid:145)The concrete future objectives of education

systems(cid:146) (COM(2001) 59),

(cid:129) having regard to the conclusions of the Lisbon European Council meeting of 23 and 24 March 2000

and the Santa Maria da Feira European Council meeting of 19/20 June 2000,

(cid:129) having regard to Rule 47(1) of its Rules of Procedure,

(cid:129) having regard to the report of the Committee on Culture, Youth, Education, the Media and Sport and
the opinions of the Committee on Budgets and the Committee on Women(cid:146)s Rights and Equal Oppor-
tunities (A5-0152/2001),

A. whereas, in accordance with the principle of subsidiarity, the Community(cid:146)s role is to encourage the

Member States to meet important goals relating to the quality of education,

B. whereas the e-Learning initiative is helping to strengthen the idea of a (cid:145)single European educational

area(cid:146), which complements the European research area and the European single market,

C. whereas know-how, knowledge and information have become the driving force of our society;
whereas the e-Learning project is helping to devise a different way of learning and must aim primarily
to extend the wealth of human understanding,

D. whereas too small a percentage of teachers and trainers have the skills required to use new techno-

logies as an integral part of their normal teaching methods,

E. whereas children(cid:146)s access to information and communication technologies is greatly affected by geo-

graphical, social and cultural inequalities,

F. whereas the high cost of telecommunications in Europe represents an obstacle to the extensive use of
the Internet and the development of the digital culture and poses the risk of widening the gap between
those who have access to the new information and communication technologies and those who do
not,

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G. whereas in terms of developing new technologies there is a gap not only between the United States
and Europe but also within the European Union itself, particularly between the eastern and western
European countries,

H. whereas there is a lack of satisfactory equipment in the majority of schools (both state and private

schools), universities and training centres in Europe, as regards both hardware and software,

I. whereas the European multimedia educational software industry is under-developed and the relation-
ship between the education and training systems and the industry has failed to generate services that
actually meet educational needs in Europe,

J. whereas the e-Learning initiative is designed to cut across various Community programmes which are
already running (managed by different Directorates-General), such as Socrates, Leonardo da Vinci,
Culture 2000, Media Plus and e-Content in the area of culture, education and training; the fifth and
the forthcoming sixth Research Framework Programme, Ten-Telecom, TSER and Meda; and possibly
also the European Social Fund and the Structural Funds,

K. whereas the success of the e-Learning initiative will depend on the extent of the financial contributions
allocated to it under each current Community programme, as well as on the financial resources made
available by the Member States,

1.

Calls on the Commission, the Council and the Member States to take account of the following points:

(a) Shares the goal set by the Heads of State and of Government of ensuring that all citizens have life-
long access to training courses in the knowledge and skills necessary for living, working and contribu-
ting to their personal enrichment in the new information society;

(b) Considers that the e-Learning project must not only take account of access to the new information
and communication technologies, but also guarantee e-content of quality, and training to use that
content;

(c) Calls on the Member States to make every effort to close the gap between those who have access to
new technologies and those who are excluded, and to provide for priority actions aimed at minority
groups, such as old people, the disabled, the unskilled and residents of isolated and island regions, and
at women;

(d) Calls on the Commission to define priority measures to reduce the new technology gap between, on
the one hand, countries within the European Union and, on the other, EU countries and the candidate
countries of eastern Europe;

(e) Calls on the Member States and the Commission to encourage cooperation between society and pri-
vate enterprise in the process of investing in new technologies, providing hardware and specifically in
extending the content networks;

(f) Calls on the Member States to promote measures to reduce the costs of access to new technologies

and the Internet;

(g) Expects that, through the e-Europe comprehensive action plan, the objectives set by the Lisbon Euro-
pean Council meeting, as well as the employment policy guidelines, can be given concrete effect;

(h) Wishes e-Learning also to give practical shape to:

(cid:129) the objectives of the Lisbon European Council, and the Stockholm follow-up to it with the report

on (cid:145)concrete future objectives of education and training systems(cid:146);

(cid:129) the employment guidelines;

(cid:129) attractive life-long learning for all; and

(cid:129) the promotion of virtual mobility;

(i)

Expects the goal set at Lisbon of equipping all schools in the Union with Internet access by the end of
2001 actually to be met and all teachers to have high-speed access to the Internet, personalised elec-
tronic mail, an annual refresher course or programme in technologies and teaching methods and
multimedia teaching resources by 2002;

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(j)

Proposes,
in accordance with the Lisbon objectives for bridging the digital gap in the emerging
information society and boosting social cohesion, to enable every schoolchild and student to have an
electronic address at their place of education;

(k) Calls on the Council and Member States to look into the possibilities for flat rates for internet access

by educational establishments;

(l) Calls on the Council and the Member States to promote the creation of a high-speed, highly flexible
and highly multi-cultural trans-European network which will link up research institutes, universities,
scientific libraries and ultimately schools, businesses and local and national administrations for the
exchange of scientific and other information in the various languages, and which can spearhead
teachers(cid:146) efforts at bench-marking and at exchanging best practice;

(m) Urges the Commission to ensure that e-Learning measures supported by Community funds give abso-
lute priority to teacher training and that, where funds allow, other sectors such as the training of
trainers or the exchange of experience between research experts are also able to enjoy Community
support;

(n) Asks the Commission and the Member States to encourage the use of ICT for school twinning and
collaboration in Europe, and to help teachers to adopt new and innovative ways of working with ICT
through Europe-wide dissemination of leading examples and practice, and with this purpose support
eSchola (cid:129) a week for e-Learning in Europe;

(o) Calls on the Commission and the Member States to ensure that the e-Learning initiative concentrates
on priority objectives: providing all schools with the necessary technological infrastructure and train-
through bench-marking
ing teachers (who, more than anyone, are responsible for education),
measures and the exchange of best practice, so that they acquire knowledge and skills in the use of
the new technologies for educational purposes, in both content and software, which should be flex-
ible, multicultural and should take account of the specific characteristics of pupils and other diverse
factors, in order to improve child and adult pupils(cid:146) capacity to learn, by developing distance learning
and differentiated and individualised teaching methods;

(p) Calls on the Commission and the Member States to ensure that the e-Learning initiative gives absolute
priority to integrating the information technologies in school curricula, by means of teaching methods
that use the new technologies; considers that teaching centres will be responsible for developing the
content of the new school curricula, thus providing a higher standard of excellence and competition
between centres;

(q) Calls on the Commission and the Member States to launch, with the e-Learning initiative, an ambi-
tious European policy for developing high-quality educational multimedia software, content and ser-
vices that are adapted to the needs of teaching and professional training;

(r) Calls on the Commission and the Member States to create the necessary fora to encourage relations
between education and training establishments and the content industry in order to generate high-
quality educational products;

(s) Calls on the Member States to ensure, by the end of 2002, that as many teachers as possible are
trained in the use of the Internet, high-speed and database networks and multimedia resources, and
to provide them, by the end of 2003, with such training as will ensure that they are (cid:145)digitally literate(cid:146)
and capable of adapting the new electronic communication systems to the classroom in a critical and
educationally responsible manner;

(t) Calls on the Member States to promote policies for motivating teachers, by showing them that the
information technologies can offer them a number of advantages: they are cost-effective, efficient and
cut red-tape in schools;

(u) Calls on the Commission to continue to help ensure, by supporting European networks such as (cid:145)Euro-
pean Schoolnet(cid:146) (cid:129) a joint initiative of the Commission and the Member States in 1997 for the devel-
opment of ICT in schools (cid:129), that training and research centres become local multipurpose knowledge
acquisition centres open to all, using methods that reflect the diverse nature of the groups at which
they are aimed and the goal of life-long learning;

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(v)

Intends to support the e-Learning initiative, which it regards as an absolute priority in the area of
education, and to provide adequate funding under the budget for the relevant coordination, manage-
ment and assessment tasks, including the human resources required;

(w) Calls on the Commission to ensure it has the necessary structures in place in order to operate suc-
cessfully, in particular an effective task force led by the EAC Directorate-General to be responsible for
the horizontal coordination of the e-Learning initiative as it affects all the Community programmes
that are involved in various ways, and to carry out an in-depth study of experience obtained to date
in the Member States in the educational use of the new technologies, in order to identify consistently
successful or less effective educational uses of the new information and communication technologies;

(x) Calls on the Commission to urge the Member States to ensure that the infrastructure provides high
quality standards, that general quality criteria and assessment rules are laid down, both for content
and the level of training courses available, and that the aim should be for bench-marking wherever
possible;

(y) Calls on the Commission to consider seriously the possibility of submitting a series of measures and
actions aimed at promoting the work of each Member State in the area of the application of new
technologies to teaching, thereby helping to reinforce the implementation of a (cid:145)European educational
area(cid:146);

(z) Calls on the Commission to support proposals and initiatives of Member States and regional auth-
orities to promote the learning of information technology skills, to adopt proposals aimed at defining
new basic skills (technical knowledge, foreign languages, etc.) and to define a system for the mutual
recognition of national qualifications and diplomas in information technology;

(aa) Calls on the Commission to define indicators to monitor the development of e-Learning, including
indicators monitoring the equality of children(cid:146)s access to information and communication techno-
logies regardless of geographical, social or cultural inequalities; these indicators will give the Member
States better information on their results in implementing e-Learning;

(ab) Recalls that in the 2001 Budget the appropriations foreseen for the e-Learning initiative under a
preparatory action in the meaning of Article 37 of the IIA of 6 May 1999 were increased by Parlia-
ment;

(ac) Stresses that, according to Article 274 of the Treaty, the Commission should implement the budget
voted, while Parliament, as part of the budgetary authority, has the responsibility to ensure the best
value for money in deciding the priorities and the monitoring of budget implementation;

(ad) Underlines that the information and knowledge-based society to which e-Learning refers is taken into

account in the guidelines for the 2002 budget procedure;

(ae)

Intends to use the instruments provided by the IIA of 6 May 1999 to fund Parliament(cid:146)s priorities in
respect of the authorised ceilings; considers that the possibility of concentrating the appropriations as
much as possible should be looked at in the context of the 2002 Budget;

(af) Expects the Commission to provide an adequate and specific legal framework for Parliament(cid:146)s prior-

ities which have received financial support and the effectiveness of which can be assessed;

(ag) Calls for the action plan which is to be submitted to the next meeting of the Council of Education
Ministers on 28 May 2001 to take due account of the principle of gender equality in all relevant
areas, with particular reference to those covered by the employment guidelines and the European
Social Agenda adopted at the Nice European Council;

(ah) Calls on the Commission and the Member States to encourage the public and private sector to close
the gap in education and training systems in informatics between female students, who constitute less
than 20 %, and male students, who constitute more than 80 %, and therefore calls for special training
schemes to be organised for women, particularly female teachers in gender segregated courses;

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(ai) Calls for specific initiatives to be taken to foster the development of appropriate educational software
for women and girls; calls for support for regional and local training centres especially for women and
girls, and calls for a reduction in the current (cid:145)digital divide(cid:146) by involving marginalised groups, such as
unemployed single mothers;

(aj) Endorses the stated objective of stepping up the interconnection of virtual forums and campuses, the
networking of universities, schools, training centres, and multi-disciplinary learning centres open to
all; calls for this to be used as an opportunity to organise and establish a register of exchanges of best
practice in the teaching and training of young girls and women.

Instructs its President to forward this resolution to the Council and Commission and the govern-

2.
ments and parliaments of the Member States.

19. Broad economic guidelines for 2001

A5-0165/2001

European Parliament resolution on the Commission(cid:146)s recommendation for the broad guidelines of
the economic policies of the Member States and the Community for 2001 (COM(2001) 224 (cid:129)
C5-0169/2001 (cid:129) 2001/2081(COS))

The European Parliament,

(cid:129) having regard to the Commission(cid:146)s recommendation (COM(2001) 224 (cid:129) C5-0169/2001),

(cid:129) having regard to Articles 98 and 99 of the Treaty establishing the European Community,

(cid:129) having regard to Rule 41 of its Rules of Procedure,

(cid:129) having regard to the Commission(cid:146)s report on the implementation of the 2000 broad economic policy

guidelines (COM(2001) 105),

(cid:129) having regard to the Commission(cid:146)s report on economic reform: report on the functioning of Com-

munity product and capital markets (COM(2000) 881),

(cid:129) having regard to the report of the Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs and the opinion of

the Committee on Employment and Social Affairs (A5-0165/2001),

A. whereas the start of 2002 is an historic juncture in that, for the first time in history, twelve sovereign

states will be sharing a common currency and using the same notes and coins,

B. whereas this represents a further stage in the process of the integration of national economies, follow-

ing on from the free-trade area, customs union and the internal market,

C. whereas it appears appropriate to use a new term for this form of cooperation between states and

describe a common market with a common currency as a (cid:145)home market(cid:146),

D. whereas at the Lisbon meeting of the European Council the Union set itself the new strategic goal of
becoming (cid:145)the most competitive and dynamic knowledge-based economy in the world with more and
better jobs and greater social cohesion(cid:146);

E. whereas the Union is now faced with the challenge of formulating appropriate common economic
policies for this (cid:145)European home market(cid:146) with a single monetary policy. These should be drawn up in
accordance with the principles of a (cid:145)social market economy(cid:146),

F. whereas, for the time being, the procedure establishing the European Union(cid:146)s broad economic policy
guidelines is the main instrument for coordinating the economic policies of the European Union,