International Conference on Non-traditional Pathways into the Teaching Profession at ZLSB

The 1st Dresden Conference on Lateral Entry and Second Career Teachers (LETE) was held in a virtual format at ZLSB on 24^th Nov – 26^th Nov 2020. More than 120 guests from 16 countries took part in the conference. The idea for the topic emerged from international meetings on the topic: "Digitalization and Lateral Entry" at the ZLSB in October 2019 and at the kick-off event of IMPRESS to strengthen the internationalization of teacher education at the ZLSB in December 2019. During these events, network partners of the ZLSB presented regional and national focal points of teacher education.

The goal of this year's international conference was to examine the teacher shortage and its impact on teacher education, as well as to identify and synchronize research efforts in the national and international discourse.

The virtual conference was opened with greetings from Prof. Dr. Gerald Gerlach (vice-rector academic affairs TU Dresden) and executive director of the ZLSB, Prof. Dr. Axel Gehrmann (TU Dresden).

In the subsequent keynote presentations, the topic of teacher shortage was presented from multiple perspectives. Prof. Gerald K. LeTendre (Pennsylvania State University) examined the relationship between teacher shortage and politically determined factors (e.g. salary differentials, unequal degrees) as well as local factors (e.g. urban-rural divide, schools with a high proportion of children with low socialeconomic status).

Prof. Dr. Falk Radisch (University of Rostock) and Prof. Dr. Axel Gehrmann, focused on alternative paths in teacher education, compared them to undergraduate teacher education and presented similarities, differences and perspectives of the teaching profession.

In poster presentations and workshops, national and international researchers engaged in an exchange on concepts of teacher education (macro-level), non-traditional pathways into the teaching profession (meso-level), and specific teaching-learning formats (micro-level).

Further collaboration in the form of publications, mutual conference participations and joint virtual meetings with our national and international partners will be continued in the coming years.

Author: Peggy Germer

1st Dresden LETE Conference 2020