Facing social reality together: investigating a pre-service teacher preparation programme on inclusive education

Inclusive education has been put on the global agenda to appreciate diversity on a broader level and reduce educational inequality. In order to optimally prepare secondary pre-service teachers for inclusive education, a highly innovative cooperation of five different teacher training institutes in and around Antwerp (Belgium) developed a collective Inclusion Pathway embedded in the various teacher education curricula. Through an explorative qualitative research study based on content data and semi-structured interviews, we studied (1) the programme's perceived impact on participating pre-service teachers' competences (attitudes, knowledge and skills) with respect to inclusion, and (2) how the pre-service teachers experience the inclusion programme. The results indicate a positive impact of the programme on the participants' attitudes with respect to inclusion. Participants also mention that the theoretical frameworks provided, the classroom observations and the teacher conversations helped them to enlarge their knowledge base and feel more confident to change their teaching practice. However, the participants also made some critical remarks. The teacher training institutes converted these insights into several organisational improvements and content-related action points.