Teacher education has been the main focus of interest for educational policies and researchers in the last decades and it is closely related to the promotion of teacher professionalism that is considered to be a prerequisite for a high-quality education system. There are many issues surrounding the new teachers – as – professionals agenda and its complex relationship to teaching and teacher education. International research has proved that there is an urgent need for policies and strategies to strengthen initial teacher education. In this context, the EU states promote policies for high quality teacher education. They all agree that initial teacher education has to give new teachers a sound knowledge of pedagogy as well as of their specialist subject matter, thus enhancing professionalism as well as educational and didactic knowledge of future teachers. However, not all teacher education systems in the EU are best prepared to provide teachers with the knowledge and skills they need to prepare young people for a constantly changing world. In Greece, with the 1997 reform, the Greek Ministry of Education tried to make some changes on the basis of the rhetoric surrounding teacher professionalism that was widely accepted. The government had to respond to the changing conditions of both education where teaching plays a major role and higher education where teachers’ initial education takes place. However, it should be noted that the changes in initial teacher education have not started from within universities. Instead, the Supreme Council for Civil Personnel Selection (ASEP) was charged with the responsibility to establish the conduct of a written competition for teachers in order to select the best ones to enter the profession and enhance professionalism after they had completed their initial education. Inflation, unemployment and the desire to enter the public sector together with the results of the expansion of higher education led thousands of candidates to enter the competition. According to the legal framework teachers are subjected to a written exam including pedagogical as well as subject matter content and are selected on the basis of their performance in exams. However, the problem has to do with secondary education teachers teaching different subjects, as their initial education programs do not provide them with pedagogical knowledge.

This study was conducted on a purpose sample of 30 candidates through semi-structured interviews and examines the relationship between candidates’ initial education and their experience of the exams. The research questions were: a) does their university-based education give them the knowledge in order to correspond to the exams successfully? b) does the examination they are subjected to promote their actual induction to the profession? The qualitative analysis gives evidence that their knowing about teaching through pre-service teacher education is not tightly coupled to the content of the exams.There is a gap between their initial education and the subjects they are examined to. So they are led to take support by organizations (frontisteria) in order to get prepared for the exams. It is obvious that the preparation for the induction to the profession has been commercialized and the technicism in it is evident.+++ continues in References!

The conclusion is that as secondary education is facing a lot of problems in Greece, teacher preparation programs and the professional development of secondary education teachers should be a priority issue in education policy so as to respond to changing needs. Moreover, the European education policies should keep a close continuum of teacher education provision embracing initial teacher education and induction to the profession and help develop effective induction schemes for all teachers in those EU member states they do not have them.